DUTIES OF THE QUEEN BEE. 
19 
common “ bee-bread,” considered good enough 
for the rest of the household, is too coarse for the 
infant queen. A delicate dish is prepared from 
flowery juices, and carefully reserved as royal 
food. This is regularly served by the attentive 
nurses who continually watch and wait upon the 
little princess. 
Thus elegantly lodged and richly fed, the fa- 
vored grub grows to her full size. She then 
spins a silken robe, which, when expanded, fills 
her chamber, and renders it soft and smooth. 
About the sixteenth day she comes forth, slowly 
and with a queenly step, differing in form, powers, 
and instincts from the other inmates of the hive. 
Encircled by golden rings, her short and filmy 
wings making a scanty gauze drapery through 
which her brilliant colors shine in beauty ; she 
looks like a queen in her royal robes. She im- 
mediately takes her place as reigning monarch, 
and all unite in honoring her. 
The queen’s chief employment seems to be 
the laying of long, slightly-curved eggs, of a 
bluish tinge. Before depositing an egg, she ex- 
amines whether the cell is properly prepared for 
