116 PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 
Her family at first consists only of workers, which are 
necessary to assist her in her labours; these appear in 
May and June: but the males and females are later, and 
sometimes are not produced before August and Septem- 
ber?. As in the case of the hive-bee, the food of these 
several individuals differs; for the grubs that will turn 
to workers are fed with honey and pollen mixed, while 
those that are destined to be males and females are sup- 
plied with pure honey. 
The instinct of these larger females does not develop 
itself all at once: for it is a remarkable fact, that when 
they are first hatched in the autumn, not being in a con- 
dition to become mothers, they are no object of jealousy 
to the small queens, (as we shall soon see they are when en- 
gaged in oviposition,) and are employed in the ordinary 
labours of the parent nest—that is, they collect honey 
and pollen, and make wax; but they do not construct 
cells. ‘The building instinct seems as it were in suspense, 
and does not manifest itself till the spring; when the 
maternal sentiment impels them at the same time to lay 
eggs and to construct the cells in which they are to be 
deposited. 
I have told you above, that amongst the wasps a small 
kind of female has been discovered: this is the case also 
amongst the humble-bees, in whose societies they are 
more readily detected: not indeed by any observable 
4 P. Huber, in Linn. Trans. vi. 264.—This author says however, in 
-another place (iid. 285), that the male eggs are laid in the spring, 
at the same time with those that are to produce workers. Perhaps 
by the former he means the male offspring of the small females, and 
by the latter those of the large ? 
