G2 NATURAL HISTORY 



were shorter, especially the sucker. The proboscis has a sort of fold- 

 joint at the head, by which it can be considerably lengthened. It is 

 the females, as also the female workers, similar to all the females of 

 the bee-tribe, only that have stings, none of the males having any ; and 

 as it is the females only that are employed in the oeconomy of the hive, 

 it is only these that are furnished with weapons. 



The humble-bee is more a defensive than an offensive animal. I 

 believe they seldom attack, only sting when laid hold of; and their sting 

 has very little effect either as to sensation or swelling. "When attacked 

 they throw themselves on their back by first raising one side, and also 

 raising the legs of that side, and then they tumble over. They are very 

 hardy, and labour in weather that the common bee will not go abroad in, 

 and this is owing to their having but little store, and their heat much 

 less than that of the common bee ; and for the same reason they work 

 much better in the evening than the common bee does, but not near so 

 late as either the hornet or wasp ; for they are not in constant employ in 

 finding food for their young, as the young feed themselves, and they 

 have store for immediate use for themselves and the young bees as they 

 hatch. They will not admit of being removed from their first situation 

 to another ; for when removed with the whole hive, as also with all the 

 bees, and confined under a shade for some days with their cells filled 

 with honey-food, they gradually leave it, but do not seem to go back to 

 their former situation, if it is distant half a mile ; from which circum- 

 stance, and from all the labourers dying, and the queen leaving the hive 

 in the winter, they are not capable of being domesticated. They are 

 not fond of having their hives meddled with or disturbed ; for then they 

 appear to get lazy, and do not breed so fast, their combs or cells not 

 answering any future purpose, not being what I have called ' the furni- 

 ture of the hive,' as in the common bee. From these circumstances they 

 are much more liable to accident, as also from their mode of forming 

 their hives, which is liable to many accidents. 



A wet season shall drown many hives, by [their] being begun by a 

 single bee, which is the mother of the colony, and which at first 

 labours abroad ; but if killed, which is often the case, the whole falls. 



It would appear that they are attacked by their own species ; for in 

 the place where I enticed them to build their hives I have found 

 another queen dead, which I supposed to have come there to take 

 possession, but to have been killed bj- the other queen and her offspring 

 or labourers, who then were but few, being only two or three. They 

 collect honey for store, but it is not of such extensive use as that of the 

 common bee, although for a time answering the same purpose, 



A family is first begun by a simple female, not colonizing like the 



