A P 
extended at pleafure. It is with tliis inftrument that they 
coiled! their food ; not by pumping or fuckihg, but by 
licking it from the neflaria of flowers. The teeth with 
which thefe infects are provided, ferve another purpofe 
equally important; they are the inftruments by which 
they fatliion and give a proper confiftency to the wax. 
That valuable commodity is not found in a perfedt ftate 
upon the flowers, as many have imagined ; it is there 
feattered upon the furface in the form of a fine powder 
or duff, and fwept off by the hairy legs of the bee, and 
depoflted in a hollow part of each thigTi, prepared for its 
reception. After being carried in that form into the 
hive, it is all eaten up by the bee; and by the adlion of the 
ltomach is brought into the ftate of genuine wax. From 
the ftomach, the working bee brings it back in fmall par¬ 
cels to the mouth like a ruminating animal ; and, by 
chewing it there, fafhions it into pieces proper for the 
conftrudtion of the cell to which it is applied, and after¬ 
wards polifhed as the fituation requires. 
That fmall fc*ly fpine, commonly termed the Jling of 
the bee, is only the cafe of two needles or darts, ex¬ 
tremely fine, and each dentated and united at the point. 
The wounds made by thefe flender arms would be little 
to be apprehended, were their points not impoifoned by 
a fmall drop of acrid liquor. This liquor, which, when 
tafted, burns the tongue, is conveyed along a fmall canal 
to the cafe of the fling, on the tip of which it appears 
in fmall drops, when the bee intends to make ufe of her 
offenfive weapons. However difagreeable this inftrument 
may fometmes prove to us, it is abfolutely neceflary to the 
bee, furrounded as that animal continually is with many 
enemies, whofe hoftilities are conflantly provoked by the 
honey and wax. The fling of the bee is alfo ufed for 
another purpofe, the propriety of which we are not fo 
well able to vindicate. At a certain time, they are 
bufy from morning till night in no other employment than 
maffacring their affociates. The males, after the female 
is fecundated, become ufelefs, and even offenfive to the 
reft of the hive. The working bees, who had formerly 
been their nurfes, and hitherto had lived with them in 
the beft underftanding, all at once break loofe upon them 
with unrelenting fury, and in two or three days deftroy 
the whole in one general carnage. Of the reafons alleged 
by the working bees for this maffacre, we are altogether 
ignorant ; we know not upon what claim their power of 
life and death over the males is founded, farther than 
that nature feems to have granted fiich a right, by giv¬ 
ing them power to exercife it. Thefe, however, are not 
the only combats in which the bees are engaged : the 
working bees of the fame hive often quarrel, and chal¬ 
lenge each other to battle ; the one endeavouring to find 
a place in the fcaly body of his adverfary into which he 
lay thruft his fling, and the other as ftudioufly warding 
ff the blow. The firft wound that takes place puts an 
end to the engagement; and the vidlorious bee walks off, 
leaving his adverfary to expire in the duft. Sometimes 
three or four attack a Angle bee, without any defign up¬ 
on his life, but with a view to force him to difgorge his 
honey; and, as foon as they have fucceeded, they lick it 
lip, allowing the former proprietor to walk away. Battles 
are alfo occafioned when a neighbouring fwarm, from po¬ 
verty, or a principle of injuftice, invade a hive already 
occupied. Scarcely have they entered the walls of the 
city, when a general engagement enfues: thofe who 
have the right of pofieffion oppofe their invaders with all 
their force, and with undaunted courage; not a minute 
palfes that you do not obferve a victorious bee dragging 
to the door of the hive a dead adverfary, or one who is 
yet ftruggling in all the agonies of death. Thefe en¬ 
gagements do not clofe but with the day; and, before vic¬ 
tory declares for either party, they often coft thoufands 
their lives ; for very often the one who has fixing its op¬ 
ponent leaves its weapon in the wound, an accident which 
proves fatal to itfelf. Infedts of their own fpecies are far 
from being the only enemies which the bees have to fear; 
Vol. I. No. 50. 
1 s. 793 
worms, wafps, hornets, and infedts of different kinds, 
never fail to make their way into the hive, whenever any 
rent or crevice is left open. When attacked by thefe 
robbers, they perifli in the unequal combat; and, when 
dead, their bodies are ripped up, in order to extract from 
them the honey they contain. Apprifed of the fatal con- 
fequences of admitting them into the hive, the bees care¬ 
fully fill up every chink and crevice, not with wax, but 
with the glutinous matter that exudes from certain trees, 
a fubllance dill more tenaceous. When a bee enters the 
hive loaded with a quantity of this duff, it is met by 
others, who take fmall particles of it, and apply it to the fides 
of the part to be flopped up, till they are entirely clofed. 
A fwarm of bees, however numerous, as we have al¬ 
ready feen, all owe their birth to a Angle female. This 
queen, which Virgil, and the other writers of antiquity 
have charged with all the cares of government, is indeed 
bufily occupied, but in functions of a different kind ; 
and thefe are, the production of a vaft number of eggs, 
which (he continues to drop, one after another, into the 
empty cells, during a confiderable part of the fummer. 
This animal, which is fo amazingly productive, on being 
opened, has been found to contain upwards of five thou- 
fand eggs, all of a (ize fufficient to be perceptible. If we 
make allowance for thofe that were already dropped, and 
many more not yet formed, fo as to become perceptible; we 
fliall no longer deem it incredible, that this animal fnould 
in one feafon become the mother of fo many thoufands. 
The mod numerous hive is far inferior to the number of 
fpawn that have been taken from the belly of a fmall fifti. 
During the whole time that the female goes from cell to 
cell depofiting her eggs, die is accompanied by the work¬ 
ing bees, who attend her with the mod: officious care. 
And, as the males and females are produced by her of a 
fuperior fize to the reft, the working bees, as if apprifed 
of the circumftance, conftrudt a few cells larger than the 
reft; and, what is dill more remarkable, the female her- 
felf knows which of the embryos are to become of her 
own fex, and accordingly depofits them in cells of a fuit- 
able capacity. The cell which is to contain the future 
queen-bee is of a ftrudlure different from all the reft ; and 
in building it, the labourers abandon the hexagonal fliape 
which is beft adapted to the faving of labour, and of 
wax ; notlung, in this inftance, feems to coft them too 
dear. The cradle of their future queen confumes as much 
as a hundred or a hundred and fifty of the ordinary cells. 
From the great number of males in each hive to a Angle 
female, the ancients were induced to believe, that fecun¬ 
dation among thefe infedls was not accomplifhed by any 
aft of copulation, but that it was performed by a vivi¬ 
fying liquor died upon the ova in the cells. But this 
opinion was overthrown, as foon as it was obferved, that 
for nine or ten months in the year there was no male in 
the hive. Swammerdam, who could not obferve that in 
thefe animals there were any parts of generation, there¬ 
fore fuppofed, that the female was impregnated folely by 
the effluvia of the male bees. The obfervations made by 
Reaumur have removed thofe difficulties with which this 
part of the hiftory of bees feerned to be attended. The 
female, who is furrounded by fo many males, inftead of 
being fatigued aud perfecuted by their importunities, is 
obliged to carefs and inflame the paffions of thefe drones, 
who are the mod cold and indifferent of all their fex. 
She mounts upon their backs, and puflies her gallantry to 
what may be deemed indecency; at length her allure¬ 
ments produce the defired effedl, and copulation is per¬ 
formed. The female thus impregnated proceeds to lay 
her eggs, which are round and oblong, rather thicker at 
the one end than the other. Each is depofited in a fepa- 
rate cell, except upon fome occaftons, when the induflry 
of the working bees has not been fufficient for the ferti¬ 
lity of the mother : die then lays twm or three in a Angle 
cell; the fupernumeraries being afterwards carried away 
and placed by themfelves, as foon as new cells are pro¬ 
vided. The Angle egg which remains is faftened to the 
bottom 
