BEES IN THE HIVE. 197 
lumbering bees of a darker colour than the rest, will, 
it is true, wander aimlessly about the hive, and wait for 
the others to feed them and house them ; but these 
are the drones, or male bees (3, Fig. 54), who never 
do any work except during one or two days in their 
whole lives. But the smaller working bees(l, Fig. 54) 
begin to be busy at once. Some fly off in search of 
Fig- 54- 
j. Worker bee. 2. Queen-bee. 3. Drone or male bee. 
honey. Others walk carefully all round the inside of 
the hive to see if there are any cracks in it ; and if 
there are, they go off to the horse-chestnut trees, 
poplars, hollyhocks, or other plants which have sticky 
buds, and gather a kind of gum called "propolis," 
with which they cement the cracks and make them 
air-tight Others again, cluster round one bee (2, Fig. 
54) blacker than the rest and having a longer body and 
shorter wings ; for this is the queen-bee, the mother of 
the hive, and she must be watched and tended. 
But the largest number begin to hang in a cluster 
from the roof just as they did from the bough of the 
apple tree. What are they doing there ? Watch for a 
little while and you will soon see one bee come out 
