50 NATURAL HISTORY 05 THE HONEY BEE. 



their tenants ; and may become so much diminished in size 

 as not to admit of the perfect development of full sized 

 bees." 



" Such are the respective stages of the working bee : 

 those of the royal bee are as follows : she passes three 

 days in the egg and is five a worm ; the workers then close 

 her cell, and she immediately begins spinning her cocoon, 

 which occupies her twenty-four hours. On the tenth and 

 eleventh days and a part of the twelfth, as if exhausted by 

 her labor, she remains in complete repose. Then she passes 

 four days and a part of the fifth as a nymph. It is on the 

 sixteenth day therefore that the perfect state of Queen is 

 attained." 



" The drone passes three days in the egg, six and a half 

 as a worm, and changes into a perfect insect on the twenty- 

 fourth or twenty-fifth day after the egg is laid." 



" The developement of each species likewise proceeds 

 more slowly when the colonies are weak or the air cool. 

 Dr. Hunter has observed that ihe eggs, worms and nymphs 

 all require a heat above 70° of Fahrenheit for their evolution." 

 The bee keeper, therefore, in all his operations, should re- 

 member that brood comb must never be exposed to so low a 

 temperature as to become chilled : the effect is as disas- 

 trous as when the eggs of a setting hen are left, for too long 

 a time, by the careless mother. The brood combs are never 

 safe when taken for any considerable lime from the bees, 

 unless the temperature is fully up to summer heat. 



" Both drones and workers on emerging from the cell are, 

 at first gray, soft and comparatively helpless, so that some 

 time elapses before they take wing." 



" The workers and drones spin complete cocoons, or inclose 

 themselves on every side, while the royal larvae construct 

 only imperfect cocoons, open behind, and enveloping only 



