NATURAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE QUEEN BEE. 



53 



The Queen, or Mother Bee, holds the 

 first rank in the colony ; — she is the parent 

 of all the young queens, drones, and work- 

 ing bees : in fine, of the whole family, who 

 emigrate from an old hive to found a new 

 establishment, and form for themselves a 

 colony in another place. 



The make of this wonderful insect is 

 wholly different from that of the other bees. 

 Like the drones, she has no triangular cavities in her hinder 

 legs, which are appropriated, in the common bee, to the re- 

 ception of the farina of plants. Her teeth are smaller than 

 those of the common bee, but larger than those of the 

 drones, and she has no brushy substance at the end of her 

 feet; — in regard to her body, she is longer and more taper 

 than the drone, but the most decided characteristic of the 

 queen bee, is the shortness of her wings, which extend only 

 to the third ring of her body, whilst the wings of the work- 

 ing bees, and especially those of the drones, extend almost 

 the whole length of the body. From this comparative short- 

 ness of her wings, the 

 ^g# queen flies with greater 



JmP tllWlttwfkiA* difficulty than the wor 



king bee, and, indeed, 

 I during her life, it sel- 

 " dom happens that she 

 I has any occasion for 

 | them. The under part 

 f of her body is of a 

 golden colour, and the 

 upper part of a brighter 

 brown, than that of 

 the common bee. In 

 the interior of her body 

 the eggs are distributed 



