194 
Psyche 
[December 
to the floor over the other members of the colony. She then 
leaves the individual which has been chastized, and frequently 
severely bitten in this manner, and quickly returns to the cell to 
protect it against the onslaughts of others; occasionally, how- 
ever, she is already too late, for some of the more active indivi- 
duals have meanwhile opened it [the cell], and have taken out 
several eggs and devoured them. 
‘Tunishment is almost always meted out only with the 
legs and mandibles, and the [chastized] individual, conscious 
of her guilt, does not even attempt to defend herself, all of her 
efforts being directed toward a hasty escape. This punishment 
sometimes is so severe that the poor creature is seriously wounded 
or even killed.*****. 
‘^When, after such interruptions, the egg-laying queen has 
again returned to the cell,******she opens the latter with her 
mandibles and lays more eggs******, molested in the same 
manner as before*****; egg-laying completed, she remains near 
the newly-laid eggs for several hours. ******* 
“The attacks of the other individuals become less and less 
frequent, and finally cease altogether; and these same little 
insects which previously tried their very best to destroy the 
newly-laid eggs, now become attentive guardians and devoted 
nurses of their embryo brothers and sisters; they keep them 
warm and provide with tender solicitude for their nourishment.’’ 
Some twenty years after the publication of this description, 
the Russian psycho-biologist Wagner (1907) published a com- 
prehensive treatise on bumblebees, in which he denies the correct- 
ness of Hoffer’s (1882-83) observation, because Wagner (p. 90) 
found that whenever he opened an egg-cell in one of his bumble- 
bee colonies, the workers invariably repaired the damage without 
molesting the eggs^. Only once did Wagner (pp. 90; 111-112) 
^In regard to these experiments of Wagner (p. 90), it may be stated that 
more than a century before it was discovered by Huber (1802) that bumblebee 
workers seldom show a desire to rob eggs after the latter are a day old. Huber 
(p. 260) says; “It seems that the old eggs are less sought after by the workers 
than those which are newh^-laid; indeed I have seldom seen workers attack 
them the second day. 
“I once tried to offer them old eggs just as the^^ were attacking the fresh 
ones; they carefully closed up the first without attempting to eat them.” 
It seems probable therefore that the eggs which Wagner (p. 90) used in 
his experiments were not newly-laid eggs. 
