
——— eS ——  eeEeEEEE—eeeEeeEeEeEeEaEaE— eee —_——— 
HYMENOPTERA. 319 
a sonorous and buzzing sound, have no palettes on their legs, the 
hairs of their brushes are not appropriated to the work of oather- 
ing, their mandibles are shorter, and they have no aculeis, or 
sting, which is the working bee’s weapon. 
The female, or queen (Fig. 313), is smaller than the male, and 
has a longer body than the working bees, and the wings, shorter 
in proportion, cover only the half of its body, whereas with the 
other bees they cover it entirely. The only part she has to 
play is that of laying eggs, and so she has no palettes and 
brushes. The sovereign is, as suits her supreme rank, exempted 
from all work. She is always escorted by a certain number of 
working bees, who brush her, lick her, present honey to her with 
their trunks, save her every kind of fatigue, and compose a train 
worthy of her feminine majesty. One ‘very remarkable fact is 
that only one queen lives in each hive. Perfect sovereign of this 
tiny state, she rules over a people of some thousands of workers. 
It is not rare to find twenty thousand working bees in a hive, 
and all submissively obey their sovereign. The number of males 
is scarcely one-tenth part of that of the working bees; and they 
only live about three months. The workers represent the active 
| life of the community. 
———— Ee 
Ee 
“The exterior of a hive,” says M. Victor Rendre, “ gives the 
best idea of this people, essentially laborious. From sun-rise to 
sunset, all is movement, diligence, bustle; it is an incessant series 
of goings and comings, of various operations which begin, con- 
tinue, and end, to be recommenced. Hundreds of bees arrive 
from the fields, laden with materials and provisions ; others cross 
them and go in their turn into the country. Here, cautious 
sentinels scrutinise every fresh arrival; there, purveyors, in a 
hurry to be back at work again, stop at the entrance to the hive, 
where other bees unload them of their burdens; elsewhere it is a 
working bee which engages in a hand-to-hand encounter with a rash 
stranger ; further on the surveyors of the hive clear it of every- 
thing which might interfere with the traffic or be prejudicial to 
health; at another point the workers are occupied in drawing out 
the dead body of one of their companions; all the outlets are 
besieged by a crowd of bees coming in and going out, the doors 
hardly suffice for this hurrying busy multitude. All appears 





























