CHAPTER I. 



WILD AND HIVE BEES. 



The Position of the Hive Bee in the Animal World — 

 System of Classification — Family Apidse — Megachile 

 centuncularis — Humble Bees. 



Nature, with a prodigality which bespeaks infinite 

 resources, has spread before the bewildered naturalist 

 between a quarter and half a million species of creatures 

 inhabiting land and sea. To marshal into system this 

 vast host, certain marked characteristics have at first 

 been laid hold of, so that all might be collected into 

 a few divisions. The classification of Huxley, which 

 I shall adopt, thus brings the whole animal world 

 under seven heads, denominated sub-kingdoms, because 

 life, in the widest sense, has been arranged under 

 kingdoms — the animal and vegetable. The second 

 sub-kingdom, Annulosa, embraces all those whose 

 bodies are definitely arranged in rings, including such 

 unlike creatures as house flies and leeches, so that 

 this sub-kingdom is naturally split into two parts — 

 Arthropoda and Anarthropoda* meaning those that 



* Ctpdpov, a joint, and 7TOU9, a foot, with the Greek privative av. 



