86 TREATISE ON THE 
its exit, a dozen or two of workersin following 
their avocations, trample without ceremony 
over the struggling creature, which is then 
forced, for the safety of its head, to pop quick- 
ly down into its cell, and wait till the unfeel- 
ing ‘crowd pass on, before it can renew its 
efforts to escape. Again and again are the 
same impatient exertions repeated by the 
same individual, and with similar mortifying 
interruptions, before it succeeds in obtaining 
its freedom. Not the slightest attention or 
sympathy is observable on the part of the 
workers in these circumstances, nor did I 
ever, in a single instance, witness the kind 
parental cares which seem |to owe their ex- 
istence to the fancy of the writers alluded to. 
During the larva-stage, as I have shown, 
the solicitude of the workers about the wel- 
fare and nourishment of their infant charge 
is extreme ; but from the moment they have 
sealed up the cell, and while the larva is un- 
dergoing its transformation, they seem to 
cease from every thing like individual atten- 
tion, and though when a brood-comb is med- 
