PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 189 
second fly, observes its course by his pocket-compass, 
and the point where the two courses intersect is that 
where the nest is situated ?. 
The natural station of bees is in the cavities of de- 
cayed trees; such trees, Mr. Knight tells us, they will 
discover in the closest recesses, and at an extraordinary 
distance from the hive; in one instance it was a mile: 
and at swarming, they sometimes are inclined to settle 
in such cavities. After the discovery of one, from twenty 
to fifty, who are a kind of scouts, may be found examin- 
ing and keeping possession of it. ‘They seem to explore 
every part of it and of the tree with the greatest atten- 
tion, even surveying the dead knots and the like’. When 
a hive stands unemployed, a swarm will also sometimes 
send scouts to take possession of it. 
How long our little active creatures repose before they 
take a second excursion I cannot precisely say. Ina 
hive the greatest part of the inhabitants generally appear 
in repose, lying together, says Reaumur, but this proba- 
bly for a short time. uber tells us, that bees may al- 
ways be observed in a hive with the head and thorax in- 
serted into cells that contain eges, and sometimes into 
empty ones: and that they remain in this situation fit 
teen or twenty minutes so motionless, that did not the 
dilatation of the segments of the abdomen prove the con- 
trary, they might be mistaken for dead. He supposes 
their object is repose from their labours®. The queen, 
a xxxi. 148. 
’ Knight in Philos. Trans. for 1807, 237. Marshall, Agricult. of 
Norfolk. 
© It has been supposed, and the supposition was adopted origi- 
nally in this work (Vor. I. Ist Ed. p. 871), that the object in this case 
is brooding the eves; but upon further consideration we incline to 
