THE YOUNG QUEENS 145 



one of the young queens, finding herself surrounded by 

 males, will cause herself to be impregnated in the swarming 

 flight, and will then drag all her people to an extraordinary 

 height and distance. In the practice of apiculture these 

 secondary and tertiary swarms are always returned to the 

 mother-hive. The queens will meet on the comb ; the 

 workers will gather around and watch their combat ; and, 

 when the stronger has overcome the weaker, they will then, 

 in their ardour for work and hatred of disorder, expel the 

 corpses, close the door on the violence of the future, forget 

 the past, return to their cells, and resume their peaceful path 

 to the flowers that await them. 



78 



We will now, in order to simplify matters, return to 

 the queen whom the bees have permitted to slaughter her 

 sisters, and resume the account of her adventures. As I 

 have already stated, this massacre will be often prevented, 

 and often sanctioned, at times when the bees apparently do 

 not intend to issue a second swarm ; for we notice the same 

 diversity of political spirit in the different hives of an apiary 

 as in the different human nations of a continent. But it is 

 clear that the bees will act imprudently in giving their 

 consent ; for if the queen should die, or stray in the nuptial 

 flight, it will be impossible to fill her place, the workers' 

 larvze having passed the age when they are susceptible 

 of royal transformation. Let us assume, however, that the 

 imprudence has been committed ; and behold our first-born, 

 therefore unique, sovereign, and recognised as such in the 



