THE BEE. 47 



met with in museums or collections of ethnological 

 curiosities. 



You will now perceive what a formidable weapon 

 the sting must be when directed by the Bee against 

 an insect of its own size ; and, after examining its 

 barbed points, you will easily understand, too, how it 

 happens, that, when the little belligerent manages to 

 penetrate your own skin, it should be compelled to 

 leave its sting behind. 



But there is another and still more dangerous 

 feature connected with the instrument than even these 

 barbs, namely that it is poisoned ; for, situated at the 

 root of the sting, there is a little sac, containing an 

 acrid fluid, supposed by some naturalists to be pure 

 formic acid, and secreted by a pair of tubes appended 

 to the receptacle*. At the moment when the sting 

 enters the object attacked, the same muscles by which 

 it is worked express a drop of the fluid from the sac, 

 and this, passing through the hoUow sheath into the 

 wound, causes the instantaneous death of the animal 

 attacked, should it be another insect ; whilst even man 

 suficrs considerable pain from the inflammation re- 

 sulting from the poison. The best mode of extracting 

 the sting, as well as the drop of fluid, is by pressing 

 the open end of the barrel of a key upon the puncture ; 

 this forces out both sting and poison, and aflbrds in- 

 stantaneous relief. 



In the queen, the sting, which is curved, is also a 

 modified ovipositor (PI. I.I. fig. 30), serving to aid her 



* Want of space has prevented us from presenting an illus- 



