APIS. 
337 
domicile, others are collecting honey to store as needful 
supplies, others are either ventilating or heating the in¬ 
terior, others act as sentinels and guard the approaches 
or patrol the passages within, and will die in that defence 
like genuine patriots, and others are in attendance upon 
the queen in her progresses through her dominions, and 
who may individually act as aides-de-camp to convey her 
commands to the rest. All these are not fanciful em¬ 
bellishments of the narrative, but substantial and well- 
authenticated facts, supported by the repetition on many 
sides of careful observations, but perplexing to human 
intelligence, for not the least wonder of this conventicle 
of wonders—the hive—is that it confounds the astute 
reason of man to comprehend it in all its significancies. 
The first necessity of a new colony is the selection of 
a locality for habitation, which is usually effected by pre¬ 
liminary trustworthy intelligencers determining upon a 
site suitable from its concurrent conveniences. A suffi¬ 
cient supply of sustenance must be conveyed by the 
emigrants to accompany the preparatory construction of 
the settlement, until land can be cleared, grain grown, 
etc., and a year at least will pass, even under the most 
favourable circumstances of the exertion of the greatest 
industry, concurrently with the most propitious succes¬ 
sion of the seasons, before it can become self-sustaining. 
But when once the wheel is fairly on the move, round it 
spins without interruption or relaxation. The colony 
thrives, increasing rapidly in its population; and where 
all have put the shoulder to the wheel it climbs the steep 
and rugged hill of prosperity, whilst those who are car¬ 
ried onward by its evolutions, from each of the man}’ 
successive terraces of this noble height, survey a broad, 
cheerful, and fertile landscape, extending itself with their 
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