VI 
THE NUPTIAL FLIGHT 
[ 82 ] 
E will now consider the manner in 
which the impregnation of the 
queen-bee comes to pass. Here again na- 
ture has taken extraordinary measures to 
favour the union of males with females 
of a different stock; a strange law, whereto 
nothing would seem to compel her; a 
caprice, or initial inadvertence, perhaps, 
whose reparation calls for the most mar- 
vellous forces her activity knows. 
If she had devoted half the genius she 
lavishes on crossed fertilisation and other 
arbitrary desires to making life more cer- 
tain, to alleviating pain, to softening death 
and warding off horrible accidents, the 
295 
