S78 AFFECTION OF INSECTS FOR THEIR YOUNG. 



while she is occupied in laying her eggs, endeavour to 

 seize them from her, and, if they succeed, greedily devour 

 them. To prevent this violence, her utmost activity is 

 scarcely adequate ; and it is only after she has again and 

 again beat off the murderous intruders and pursued them 

 to the furthest verge of the nest, that she succeeds in her 

 operation. When finished, she is still under the neces- 

 sity of closely guarding the cell, which the gluttonous 

 workers would otherwise tear open, and devour the eggs. 

 This duty she performs for six or eight hours with the 

 vigilance of an Argus, at the end of which time they lose 

 their taste for this food, and will not touch it even when 

 presented to them. Here the labours of the mother 

 cease, and are succeeded by those of the workers. These 

 know the precise hour when the grubs have consumed 

 their stock of food, and from that time to their maturity 

 regularly feed them with either honey or pollen, intro- 

 duced in their proboscis through a small hole in the co- 

 ver of the cell opened for the occasion and then care- 

 fully closed. 



They are equally assiduous in another operation. As 

 the grubs increase in size the cell which contained them 

 becomes too small, and in their exertions to be more at 

 ease they split its thin sides. To fill up these breaches 

 as fast as they occur with a patch of wax, is the office of 

 the workers, who are constantly on the watch to discover 

 when their services are wanted ; and thus the cells daily 

 increase in size, in a way which to an observer ignorant 

 of the process seems very extraordinary. 



The last duty of these affectionate foster-parents is to 

 assist the young bees in cutting open the cocoons which 



