GENERAL HISTORY OF BEES. 
33 
and membranous substance. All these four joints are 
either conterminal, or the two apical ones, or one of 
them is articulated laterally, towards the apex of the 
preceding joint. These two are always very short 
joints, and are comparatively robust. 
The labial palpi are, in the majority of cases, about 
half or two-thirds the length of the tongue, but in 
Apathus and Apis they are of its full length. At the im¬ 
mediate base of the tongue, and attached to it laterally, 
rather than to the apex of the labium , are the paraglossce, 
or lingual appendages, which are membranous and acute, 
except in the Andrenidce, where, in some, their apex is 
lacerated and fringed with short hairs. These organs 
are always present in the Andrenidce and generally in 
the Apidce, where they usually obtain extensive relative 
development; but in the artisan bees they are all but 
obsolete, and in Ceraiina, Ccelioxys, Apathus, and Apis, 
they are not even apparent. Their use also has hitherto 
eluded discovery, but that they are not essential to the 
lioney-gathering instinct of the bee is especially proved 
by the latter instance. 
The true tongue is attached to the centre of the apex 
of the labium, having the paraglossse, when extant, and 
the labial palpi at its sides. In the Andrenidce it is a 
flat short organ of varying form, either lobated, emargi- 
nate, acute, or lanceolate; but in the Apidce, with Panur- 
gus it immediately becomes very much elongated, and 
with this genus the apparatus whereby the tongue folds 
beneath obtains its immediate development; but this 
development exhibits itself most fully in the genus An- 
thophora. The tongue is usually linear, tapering slightly 
to its extremity, and terminating in some genera with a 
small knob. It is clothed throughout with a very delicate 
D 
