THE YOUNG QUEENS 135 



alone, that her kingdom has yet to be conquered, that close 

 by pretenders are hiding ; and she eagerly paces the waxen 

 walls in search of her rivals. But there intervene here the 

 mysterious decisions and wisdom of instinct, of the spirit of 

 the hive, or the assembly of workers. The most surprising 

 feature of all, as we watch these things happening before us 

 in a hive of glass, is the entire absence of hesitation, of the 

 slightest division of opinion. There is not a trace of discussion 

 or discord. The atmosphere of the city is one of absolute 

 unanimity, preordained, which reigns over all ; and every one 

 of the bees would appear to know in advance the thought 

 of her sisters. And yet this moment is the gravest, the 

 most vital in their entire history. They have to choose 

 between three or four courses whose results, in the distant 

 future, will be totally different ; which, too, the slightest acci- 

 dent may render disastrous. They have to reconcile the multi- 

 plication of species — which is their passion, or innate duty 

 — with the preservation of the hive and its people. They 

 will err at times ; they will successively send forth three or 

 four swarms, thereby completely denuding the mother-city ; 

 and these swarms, too feeble to organise, will succumb, it 

 may be, at the approach of winter, caught unawares by this 

 climate of ours, which is different far from their original 

 climate that the bees, notwithstanding all, have never forgotten. 

 In such cases they suffer from what is known as "swarming 

 fever, " a condition wherein life, as in ordinary fever, reacting 

 too ardently on itself, passes its aim, completes the circle, and 

 discovers only death. 



