110 
THE HIVE AND HONEY-BEE. 
Fall, the males perish, while the impregnated females, 
retreating into Winter quarters, remain dormant till warm 
weather restores them to activity, that each may become 
the mother of a new family. 
The honey-bee, however, is so organized that it must 
live in a community during the entire year; for while the 
balmy breezes of the Spring will quickly thaw the frozen 
body of a torpid wasp, the bee is chilled by a temperature 
no lower than 50° ; and it would be as impossible to re¬ 
store a frozen bee to animation, as to recall to life the 
stift'ened corpses in the charnel-house of the Convent of 
the Great St. Bernard. Bees, therefore, in cool weather, 
must associate in large numbers, to maintain the heat 
necessary for their preservation ; and the formation of new 
colonies, after the manner of wasps and hornets, is out of 
the question. Even if the young queens, like the mother- 
wasps, were able, without any assistance, to found new 
colonies, they could not maintain the warmth requisite for 
the development of their young. And if this were pos¬ 
sible, and they were furnished with a proboscis, for gath¬ 
ering honey, as long as that of a worker, baskets on their 
thighs for carrying bee-bread, and pouches on their abdo¬ 
mens for secreting wax, they would still be unable to 
amass treasures for our use, or even to lay up the stores 
requisite for their own preservation. 
How admirably are all these difficulties obviated by the 
present arrangement! Their domicile being well supplied 
with all the requisite materials, the bees have added 
thousands, in the full vigor of youth, to their already nu¬ 
merous population, while such insects as depend upon 
the heat of the sun are still dormant. They can thus 
send off early colonies, strong enough to take full advan¬ 
tage of the honey-harvest, and to provision the new hive 
against the approach of Winter. From these considers- 
