XN 
The Life of the Bee 
of abundance, the embarrassing presence 
in the hive of three or four hundred 
males, from whose ranks the queen about 
to be born shall select her lover; three 
or four hundred foolish, clumsy, useless, 
noisy creatures, who are pretentious, glut- 
tonous, dirty, coarse, totally and scan- 
dalously idle, insatiable, and enormous. 
But after the queen’s impregnation, 
when flowers begin to close sooner, and 
open later, the spirit one morning will 
coldly decree the simultaneous and gen- 
eral massacre of every male. It regulates 
the workers’ labours, with due regard to 
their age ; it allots their task to the nurses 
who tend the nymphs and the larvae, the 
ladies of honour who wait on the queen 
and never allow her out of their sight ; 
the house-bees who air, refresh, or heat 
the hive by fanning their wings, and 
hasten the evaporation of the honey that 
may be too highly charged with water; 
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