243 
COMMON HUMBLE BEE. 
(BOMBUS TEllIlKSTltlS.) 
Plate XIV. 
Apis terrestris, Linn. Kirby's Monog. Apttm, ii. 350.— Shaw's 
general Zool. vi. 340, PI. 98. — Donov. Brit. Ins. iii. PI. 88, 
fig. 1. — A. Audax, Harris' Expos, of Eng. Ins. xxxviii. fig. 1. 
— Reaumur, vi. Tab. 3, fig. 1. 
In its present restricted sense the genus Bombus 
may be briefly characterised by the following defini- 
tion ; body oblong, and very hairy ; head narrower 
than the thorax, usually triangular, the antennae 
having thirteen joints in the female, fourteen in the 
male, geniculated at the second joint; exterior palpi 
exarticulate, interior two-jointed ; ligula three-lobed, 
the central lobe elongated ; labium transverse sub- 
linear ; hinder tibiaa provided with a hollow expan- 
sion for collecting pollen ; claws bifid at the apex. 
The species named above is one of the best known, 
and an account of its habits will convey a pretty 
accurate notion of the proceedings of the rest, although 
they vary somewhat in their modes of life. In the 
female, the head and antenna; are black, the mouth 
with rufescent hairs ; proboscis scarcely longer than 
the head ; thorax black, with a bright-yellow band 
anteriorly ; basal segment of the abdomen black, 
second yellow, third black, the three posterior ones 
white ; wings light-brown, the thick nervures dark 
coloured, the finer ones ferruginous ; legs black and 
hairy, the pollen, brush, and spines ferruginous. The 
male has the thoracic and abdominal bands either 
