72 NATURAIi HISTORY OP THE HONEY BEE. 



labor or exercise : as a Queen, it never leaves the hive, 

 after impregnation, except to accompany a new swarm. 



5th. The term of its life is remarkably lengthened. As 

 a worker, it would not have lived more than six or seven 

 months ; as a Queen it may live seven or eight times as 

 long ! All these wonders rest on the impregnable basis 

 of complete demonstration, and instead of being witnessed 

 only by a select few, may now, by the use of my hive, be 

 familiar sights to any bee keeper, who prefers to acquaint 

 himself with facts, rather than to cavil and sneer at the 

 labors of others.* 



* Having already spoken of Swammerdam, I shall give from the 

 celebrated Dr. Boerhaave's memoir of this wonderful naturalist, a 

 brief extract which should put to the blush, if any thing can, the arro- 

 gance of those superficial observers, who are too wise in their own 

 conceit, to avail themselves of the knowledge of others. 



"This treatise on Bees proved so fatiguing a performance, that 

 Swammerdam never afterwards recovered even the appearance of his 

 former health and vigor. He was almost continually engaged by day 

 in making observations, and as constantly engaged by night in record- 

 ing them by drawings and suitable explanations." 



"This being Summer work, his daily labor began at six in the 

 morning, when the sun afforded him light enough to survey such mi- 

 nute objects ; and from that hour till twelve, he continued without in- 

 terruption, all the while exposed in the open air to the scorching heat 

 of the sun, bareheaded for fear of intercepting his sight, and his head, 

 in a manner dissolving into sweat under the irresistible ardors of that 

 powerful luminary. And if he desisted at noon, it was only because 

 the strength of his eyes was too much weakened, by the extraordinary 

 afflux of light, and the use of microscopes, to continue any longer upon 

 such small objects, though as discernable in the afternoon, as they had 

 been in the forenoon." 



" Our author, the better to accomplish his vast, unlimited views, 

 often wished for a year of perpetual heat and light to perfect his in- 

 quiries, with a polar night to reap all the advantages of them, by 

 proper drawings and descriptions." 



