58 The Honey-Makers 



In dealing with the bee's power of movement, it is right 

 that the wings have precedence of the legs, they being the 

 more poetical, dainty, and as well uppermost in position of 

 all the organs of progression. 



The description of bees given by Moffett that " they have 

 four wings, being of a bright and clear color, growing to 

 their shoulder-blades, whereof the two hindermost are the 

 lesser, because they might not hinder their flying," is not 

 without its merits. 



Certainly they have four wings of a bright and clear color. 



One could scarcely better describe the appearance of the 

 shining transparent gauzes that adorn the bee's back, and 

 if they are not attached to the shoulder-blades, at least they 

 are attached to what doubtless would be shoulder-blades if 

 the bee had shoulders. 



They are where the shoulder-blades of the human being 

 are located, and to speak of them in this way immediately 

 and accurately places them, in the imaginative and unpreju- 

 diced mind of the non-scientific observer. 



It is true, too, that there are four of them, and that the 

 hindermost are the lesser. 



When flying, a bee appears to have but two wings, and 

 practically this is true ; but when it comes to rest, these two 

 accommodatingly resolve themselves into four, in order that 

 the hindermost and lesser pair may be tucked away beneath 

 the foremost and greater pair. 



The smaller and lighter the wings, the less do they 

 hamper the movements of the bee, yet they must be strong 

 and firm; and these wings have 

 r a stiff framework like that of a 



kite, and like that are also over- 

 laid with a thin light membrane 

 against which the air can find resistance. The lines of the 

 framework though quite complex are very constant, so that 



