80 PHYSIOLOGY OF THE HONEY-BEE. 
Their proper office is to impregnate the young queens. 
“Their short proboscis sips 
No luscious nectar from the wild thyme’s lips, 
From the lime’s leaf no amber drops they steal, 
Nor bear their grooveless thighs the foodful meal: 
On other’s toils in pamper’d leisure thrive 
The lazy fathers of the industrious hive.” 
Evans. 
186. The drones begin to make their appearance in 
April or May; earlier or later, according to the forwardness 
of the season, and the strength of the colony. Like the other 
inhabitants of the hive they cannot perform the work for 
which they are intended, till at least one week old. They 
go out of the hives only when the weather is warm, and at 
mid-day. 
187. As we have seen (122), the mating of the queen 
with a drone always takes place in the air. Physiologists 
say that it cannot be otherwise, because the sexual organs 
of the drone cannot be extruded unless his abdomen is 
swelled by the filling of all the tracheze with air. This hap- 
pens only in swift flight (74). 
Dzierzon supposes that the sound of the queen’s wings, 
when she is in the air, excites the drones. Evidently their 
eyes (11) and ears (25) which are highly developed, as 
proven by Cheshire, help them also in the search of the 
queen, which is their sole occupation, when in the field. In 
the interior of the hive, they are never seen to notice her; 
so that she is not molested, even if thousands are members 
of the same colony with herself. But outside of the hive, 
they readily follow her, led, according to Dzierzon, by the 
peculiar hum of her flight, and certainly also, by the senses 
of smell and of sight, which are more perfect than those of 
the worker, most likely for this single purpose. 
“When the queen flies abroad, the fleetest drone is more likely 
to succeed in his addresses than another, and thus he impresses 
upon posterity some part of his own superior activity and en- 
