THE DRONE AND HIS STORY 239 



From the very first the drone is nurtured in 

 a different way from the worker-bee. The egg is 

 laid in a wider and deeper cell ; and during its first 

 three days of life the drone-larva is fed with bee- 

 milk, probably of a special kind and certainly of 

 more generous quantity. After the third day this 

 chyle-food is reduced, as is the case with the 

 worker-grub ; but while the worker is then given 

 only honey, it is certain that the drone-larva 

 receives both honey and pollen, and that for a 

 full day longer. In all, it takes about twenty-four 

 ■ or twenty-five days to produce the perfect drone- 

 bee, as against an average twenty-one days for the 

 worker. The queen-bee, as has been already seen, 

 is developed in much less time than either, little 

 more than a fortnight elapsing between the time 

 the egg is laid and the time she is ready to gna,w 

 her way out of the cell. 



After the drone is hatched, it will be another 

 two weeks or so before he makes his first venture 

 in the open air. All this time he has the free run 

 of the larder, and steadily gorges himself on honey 

 when he is not sleeping off the effects of his surfeit 

 in some snug, out-of-the-way corner of the hive. 

 But honey is not his only, or even his principal, 

 food. Throughout his whole life he is constantly 

 fed by the house -bees with the rich chyle- food 

 given to him as a larva, and it has been proved 

 that if this is withheld from him for the space of 

 three days he will die of starvation, even in the 



