The Life of the Bee 
the ascending spiral of their intertwined 
flight whirls for one second in the hostile 
madness of love. 
87 
Most.creatures have a vague belief that 
a very precarious hazard, a kind of trans- 
parent membrane, divides death from love, 
and that the profound idea of Nature 
demands that the giver of life should die 
at the rnoment of giving. Here this idea, 
whose memory lingers still over the kisses 
of man, is realised in its primal simplicity. 
No sooner has the union been accomplished 
than the male’s abdomen opens, the organ 
detaches itself, dragging with it the mass 
of the entrails, the wings relax, and, as 
though struck by lightning, the emptied 
body turns and turns on itself .and sinks 
into the abyss. 
The same idea that before, in partheno- 
genesis, sacrificed the future of the hive 
to the unwonted multiplication of males, 
now sacrifices the male to the future of 
the hive. 
This idea is always astounding; and the 
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