LETTER XIX.

_SOCIETIES OF INSECTS._

PERFECT SOCIETIES CONTINUED. (_The Hive-bee_[125].)

The glory of an all-wise and omnipotent Creator, you will acknowledge, is wonderfully manifested by the varied proceedings of those social tribes of which I have lately treated: but it shines forth with a brightness still more intense in the instincts that actuate the common _hive-bee_ (_Apis mellifica_), and which I am next to lay before you. Indeed, of all the insect associations, there are none that have more excited the attention and admiration of mankind in every age, or been more universally interesting, than the colonies of these little useful creatures. Both Greek and Roman writers are loud in their praise; nay, some philosophers were so enamoured of them, that, as I observed before[126], they devoted a large portion of their time to the study of their history. Whether the knowledge they acquired was at all equivalent to the years that were spent in the attainment of it, may be doubted: for, were it so, it is probable that Aristotle and Pliny would have given a clearer and more consistent account of the inhabitants of the hive than they have done. Indeed had their discoveries borne any proportion to the long tract of time asserted to have been employed by some in the study of these insects, they ought to have rivalled, and even exceeded, those of the Reaumurs and Hubers of our own age.

Numerous, and wonderful for their absurdity, were the errors and fables which many of the ancients adopted and circulated with respect to the generation and propagation of these busy insects. For instance,--that they were sometimes produced from the putrid bodies of oxen and lions; the kings and leaders from the brain, and the vulgar herd from the flesh--a fable derived probably from swarms of bees having been observed, as in the case of Samson[127], to take possession of the dried carcases of these animals, or perhaps from the myriads of flies (for the vulgar do not readily distinguish flies from bees) often generated in their putrescent flesh. They adopted another notion equally absurd; that these insects collect their young progeny from the blossoms and foliage of certain plants. Amongst others, the Cerinthus, the reed, and the olive-tree, had this virtue of generating infant bees attributed to them[128]. These specimens of ancient credulity will suffice.

But do not think that all the ancients imbibed such monstrous opinions. Aristotle's sentiments seem to have been much more correct, and not very wide of what some of our best modern apiarists have advanced. According to him, the kings (so he denominates the queen-bee) generate both kings and workers; and the latter the drones. This he seems to have learned from keepers of bees. The kings, says he in another place, are the parents of the bees, and the drones their children. It is right, he observes again, that the kings (which by some were called mothers) should remain within the hive unfettered by any employment, because they are made for the multiplication of the species[129]. To the same purpose Riem of Lauten of the _Palatinate Apiarian Society_, and Wilhelmi of the _Lusatian_, affirm that the queen lays the eggs which produce the queens and workers; and the workers those that produce the drones or males[130]. Aristotle also tells us, that some in his time affirmed that the bees (the workers) were the females, and the drones the males: an opinion which he combats from an analogy pushed rather too far, that nature would never give offensive armour to females[131]. In another place he appears to think that the workers are hermaphrodites:--his words are remarkable, and seem to indicate that he was aware of the sexes of plants: "having in themselves," says he, "_like plants_, the male and the female[132]."

Fables and absurdities, however, are not confined to the ancients, nor even to those moderns who lived before Swammerdam, Maraldi, Reaumur, Bonnet, Schirach, John Hunter, Huber, and their followers, by their observations and discoveries had thrown so much light upon this interesting subject. Even in our own times, a Neapolitan professor, Monticelli, asserts, on the authority of a certain father Tanoya, that in every hive there are three sorts of bees independent of each other; viz. male and female drones--male and female, I must not say _queens_--call them what you will: and male and female workers; and that each construct their own cells!!! Enough, however, upon this subject. I shall now endeavour to lay before you the best authenticated facts in the history of these animals; but you must not expect an account of them complete in all its parts; for, much as we know, Bonnet's observation will still hold good: "The more I am engaged in making fresh observations upon bees, the more steadfast is my conviction, that the time is not yet arrived in which we can draw satisfactory conclusions with respect to their policy. It is only by varying and combining experiments in a thousand ways, and by placing these industrious flies in circumstances more or less removed from their ordinary state, that we can hope to ascertain the right direction of their instinct, and the true principles of their government[133]."

What I have further to say concerning these admirable creatures, will be principally taken from the two authors who have given the clearest and most satisfactory account of them, Reaumur and the elder Huber; though I shall add from other sources such additional observations as may serve better to elucidate their history.

The society of a hive of bees, besides the young brood, consists of one female or queen; several hundreds of males or drones; and many thousand workers.

The _female_, or queen, first demands our attention. Two sorts of females have been observed amongst the bees, a large one and a small. Mr. Needham was the first that observed the latter; and their existence, M. P. Huber tells us, has been confirmed by several observations of his father. They are bred in cells as large as those of the common queens, from which they differ only in size. Though they have ovaries, they have never been observed to lay eggs[134]. Having never seen one of these, for they are of very rare occurrence, my description must be confined to the common female, the genuine monarch of the hive[135].

There are two descriptions of males--one not bigger than the workers, supposed to be produced from a male egg laid in a worker's cell. The common males are much larger, and will counterpoise two workers.

I have before observed to you that there are two sorts of workers, the wax-makers and nurses[138]. They may also be further divided into fertile and sterile[139]: for some of them, which in their infancy are supposed to have partaken of some portion of the royal jelly, lay male eggs. There is found in some hives, according to Huber, a kind of bees, which from having less down upon the head and thorax appear blacker than the others, by whom they are always expelled from the hive, and often killed. Perfect ovaries, upon dissection, were discovered in these bees, though not furnished with eggs. This discovery induced M^{lle} Jurine, the lady who dissected them, to examine the common workers in the same way; and she found in all that she examined, what had escaped Swammerdam, perfect though sterile ovaries[140]. It is worth inquiry, though M. Huber gives no hint of this kind, whether these were not in fact superannuated bees, that could no longer take part in the labours of the hive. Thorley remarks, which confirms this idea, that if you closely observe a hive of bees in July, you may perceive many amongst them of a dark colour, with wings rent and torn; but that in September not one of them is to be seen[141]. Huber does not say whether the wings of the bees in question were lacerated; but in superannuated insects the hair is often rubbed off the body, which gives them a darker hue than that of more recent individuals of the same species. Should this conjecture turn out true, their banishment and destruction of the seniors of the hive would certainly not show our little creatures in a very amiable point of view. Yet it seems the law of their nature to rid their community of all supernumerary and useless members, as is evident from their destruction of the drones after their work is done.

It is not often that insects have been weighed; but Reaumur's curiosity was excited to know the weight of bees; and he found that 336 weighed an ounce, and 5376 a pound. According to John Hunter, an ale-house pint contains 2160 workers.

I have described to you the persons of the different individuals that compose the society of the bee-hive more in detail than I should otherwise have done, in order that you may be the better able to form a judgement upon a most extraordinary circumstance in their history, which is supported by evidence that seems almost incontrovertible. The fact to which I allude is this--that if the bees are deprived of their queen, and are supplied with comb containing young worker brood only, they will select one or more to be educated as queens; which, by having a royal cell erected for their habitation, and being fed with royal jelly for not more than two days, when they emerge from the pupa state (though, if they had remained in the cells which they originally inhabited, they would have turned out workers) will come forth complete queens, with their form, instincts, and powers of generation entirely different. In order to produce this effect, the grub must not be more than three days old; and this is the age at which, according to Schirach, (the first apiarist who called the public attention to this miracle of nature,) the bees usually elect the larvæ to be royally educated; though it appears from Huber's observations, that a larva two days or even twenty-four hours old will do[142].--Having chosen a grub, they remove the inhabitants and their food from two of the cells which join that in which it resides; they next take down the partitions which separate these three cells; and, leaving the bottoms untouched, raise round the selected worm a cylindrical tube, which follows the horizontal direction of the other cells: but since at the close of the third day of its life its habitation must assume a different form and direction, they gnaw away the cells below it, and sacrifice without pity the grubs they contain, using the wax of which they were formed to construct a new pyramidal tube, which they join at right angles to the horizontal one, the diameter of the former diminishing insensibly from its base to its mouth. During the two days which the grub inhabits this cell, like the common royal cells now become vertical[143], a bee may always be observed with its head plunged into it; and when one quits it another takes its place. These bees keep lengthening the cell as the worm grows older, and duly supply it with food, which they place before its mouth, and round its body. The animal, which can only move in a spiral direction, keeps incessantly turning to take the jelly deposited before it; and thus slowly working downwards, arrives insensibly near the orifice of the cell, just at the time that it is ready to assume the pupa; when, as before described, the workers shut up its cradle with an appropriate covering[144].

When you have read this account, I fear, with the celebrated John Hunter, you will not be very ready to believe it, at least you will call upon me to bring forth my "strong reasons" in support of it. What!--you will exclaim--can a larger and warmer house (for the royal cells are affirmed to enjoy a higher temperature than those of the other bees[145]), a different and more pungent kind of food, and a vertical instead of a horizontal posture, in the first place, give a bee a differently shaped tongue and mandibles; render the surface of its posterior tibiæ flat instead of concave; deprive them of the fringe of hairs that forms the basket for carrying the masses of pollen; of the auricle and pecten which enable the workers to use these tibiæ as pincers[146]; of the brush that lines the inside of their plantæ? Can they lengthen its abdomen; alter its colour and clothing; give a curve to its sting; deprive it of its wax-pockets, and of the vessels for secreting that substance; and render its ovaries more conspicuous, and capable of yielding female as well as male eggs? Can, in the next place, the seemingly trivial circumstances just enumerated altogether alter the instinct of these creatures? Can they give to one description of animals address and industry; and to the other astonishing fecundity? Can we conceive them to change the very passions, tempers, and manners? That the very same fœtus if fed with more pungent food, in a higher temperature and in a vertical position, shall become a female destined to enjoy love, to burn with jealousy and anger, to be incited to vengeance, and to pass her time without labour--that this very same fœtus, if fed with more simple food, in a lower temperature, in a more confined and horizontal habitation, shall come forth a worker zealous for the good of the community, a defender of the public rights, enjoying an immunity from the stimulus of sexual appetite and the pains of parturition--laborious, industrious, patient, ingenious, skilful--incessantly engaged in the nurture of the young; in collecting honey and pollen; in elaborating wax; in constructing cells, and the like!--paying the most respectful and assiduous attention to objects which, had its ovaries been developed, it would have hated and pursued with the most vindictive fury till it had destroyed them! Further, that these factitious queens (I mean those that the bees elect from amongst worker brood, and educate to supply the place of a lost one in the manner just described) shall differ remarkably from the natural queens, (or those that have been wholly educated in a royal cell,) in being altogether mute[147]--. All this, you will think at first sight, so improbable, and next to impossible, that you will require the strongest and most irrefragable evidence before you will believe it.

In spite of all these powerful probabilities to the contrary, this astonishing and seemingly incredible fact rests upon strong foundations, and is established by experiments made at different times, by different persons of the highest credit, in different parts of Europe. The first who brought it before the public (as I lately observed) was M. Schirach, secretary of an Apiarian Society established at Little Bautzen in Upper Lusatia. He observed, that bees when shut up with a portion of comb, containing only worker brood, would soon erect royal cells, and thus obtain queens:--the experiment was frequently repeated, and the result was almost uniformly the same. In one instance he tried it with a single cell, and it succeeded[148]. This curious fact was communicated to the celebrated Bonnet, who, though he hesitated long before he admitted it, was at length fully convinced. M. Wilhelmi (Schirach's brother-in-law), though at first he accounted for the fact upon other principles, and objected strongly to the doctrine in question, induced by the powerful evidence in favour of it, at last gave up his former opinion, and embraced it. And, to mention no more, the great Aristomachus of modern times, M. Huber, by experiments repeated for ten years, was fully convinced of the truth of Schirach's position[149].

The fact in question, though the public attention was first called to it by the latter gentleman, had indeed been practically known long before he wrote. M. Vogel, in a letter to Wilhelmi, asserts that numerous experiments confirming this extraordinary fact had been made by more than a hundred different persons, in the course of more than a hundred years; and that he himself had known old cultivators of bees who had unanimously declared to him, that, when proper precautions were taken, in a practice of more than fifty years, the experiment had never failed[150]. Signor Monticelli, the Neapolitan professor before mentioned, informs us that the Greeks and Turks of the Ionian Islands know how to make artificial swarms; and that the art of producing queens at will has been practised by the inhabitants of a little Sicilian island called Favignana, from very remote antiquity; and he even brings arguments to prove that it was no secret to the Greeks and Romans[151], though had the practice been common it would surely have been noticed by Aristotle and Pliny.

Bonner, a British apiarist, asserts that he has had successful recourse to the Lusatian experiment[152]; and Mr. Payne of Shipdam in Norfolk (who for many years has been engaged in the culture of bees, and has paid particular attention to their proceedings) relates that he well remembers that the bees of one of his hives, which he discovered had lost their queen, were engaged in erecting some royal cells upon the ruins of some of the common ones. He also informs me that he has found Huber's statements, as far as he has had an opportunity of verifying them, perfectly accurate[153].

As I think you will allow that the evidence just detailed to you is abundantly sufficient to establish the fact in question, we will now see whether any satisfactory account can be given for such changes being produced by such causes. "It does not appear to me improbable," says Bonnet, "that a certain kind of nutriment, and in more than usual abundance, may cause a development in the grubs of bees, of organs which would never be developed without it. I can readily conceive also, that a habitation considerably more spacious, and differently placed, is absolutely necessary to the complete development of organs which the new nutriment may cause to grow in all directions[154]." And again, with respect to the wings of the queen bee, which do not exceed those of the workers in length, he thinks that this may arise from their being of a substance too stiff to admit of their extension. Those parts and points that were in a state to yield most easily to the action which this kind of nutriment produced, would be most prominent; and the vertical position of the grub and pupa, since nature does nothing in vain, may probably assist this action, and render the parts of the animal more capable of such extension than if it continued in a horizontal position.

We know, with respect to the human species and the larger animals, that numerous differences, both as to the form and relative proportion of parts, occur continually. The cause of these differences we cannot always ascertain; yet in many instances they may either be derived from the nutriment which the embryo receives in the womb, or from the greater or less dimensions or higher or lower temperature of that organ--a case that analogically would not be very wide of that of the grub or embryo of a bee inclosed in a cell. Some of the differences in man I now allude to, may often be caused by a particular diet in childhood; a warmer or a colder, a looser or a tighter dress, or the like. Thus, for instance, the Egyptians, who went bare-headed, had their skulls remarkably thick; while the Persians, who covered the head with a turban or mitre, were distinguished by the tenuity of theirs. Again, the inhabitants of certain districts are often remarkable for peculiarities of form, which are evidently produced by local circumstances.

The following reasoning may not be inapplicable to the development or non-development, according to their food and habitation, of the ovaries of these insects. An infant tightly swathed, as was formerly the custom, in swaddling bands, without being allowed the free play of its little limbs, fed with unwholesome food, or uncherished by genial warmth, may from these circumstances have so imperfect a development of its organs as to be in consequence devoted to sterility. When a cow brings forth two calves, and one of them is a female, it is always barren, and partakes in part of the characters of the other sex[155]. In this instance, the space and food that in ordinary cases are appropriated to one, are divided between two; so that a more contracted dwelling and a smaller share of nutriment seem to prevent the development of the ovaries.

The following observations, mostly taken from an essay of the celebrated anatomist John Hunter, in the _Philosophical Transactions_, since they are intimately connected with the subject that we are now considering, will not be here misplaced. In animals just born, or very young, there are no peculiarities of shape, exclusive of the primary distinctions, by which one sex may be known from the other. Thus secondary distinctive characters, such as the beard in men, and the breasts in women, are produced at a certain period of life; and these secondary characters, in some instances, are changed for those of the other sex; which does not arise from any action at the first formation, but takes place when the great command "Increase and multiply" ceases to operate. Thus women in advanced life are sometimes distinguished by beards; and after they have done laying, hen-birds occasionally assume the plumage of the cock; this has been observed more than once by ornithologists, more particularly with respect to the pheasant and the pea-hen[156].--For females to assume the secondary characters of males, seems certainly a more violent change, than for a worker bee, which may be regarded as a sterile female, in consequence of a certain process, to assume the secondary characters of a fertile female.

With respect to the variations of instinct and character which result from the different modes of rearing the young bees that we are now considering; it would not, I think, be difficult to prove, that causes at first sight equally inadequate have produced effects full as important on the habits, tempers, and characters of men and other animals: but as these will readily occur to you, I shall not now enlarge upon them.

Did we know the causes of the various deviations, as to form and the like, observable in the three kingdoms of nature, and could apply them, we should be able to produce these deviations at our pleasure. This is exactly what the bees do. Their instinct teaches them that a certain kind of food, supplied to a grub inhabiting a certain dwelling, in a certain position, will produce certain effects upon it, rendering it different from what it would have been under ordinary circumstances, and fitted to answer their peculiar wants.

I trust that these arguments and probabilities will in some degree reconcile you to what at first sight seems so extraordinary and extravagant a doctrine. If not yet fully satisfied, I can only recommend your having recourse to experiments yourself. Leaving you therefore to this best mode of proof, I shall proceed to another part of my history:--but first I must mention an experiment of Reaumur's, which seems to come well in here. To ascertain whether the expectation of a queen was sufficient to keep alive the instinct and industry of the worker-bees, he placed in a glazed hive some royal cells containing both grubs and pupæ, and then introduced about 1000 or 1500 workers and some drones. These workers, which had been deprived of their queen, at first destroyed some of the grubs in these cells; but they clustered around two that were covered in, as if to impart warmth to the pupæ they contained; and on the following day they began to work upon the portions of comb with which he had supplied them, in order to fix and lengthen them. For two or three days the work went on very leisurely, but afterwards their labours assumed their usual character of indefatigable industry[157]. There is no difficulty, therefore, when a hive loses its sovereign, to supply the bees with an object that will interest them, and keep their works in progress.

There are a few other facts with respect to the larvæ and pupæ of the bees, which, before I enter upon the history of them in their perfect form, I shall now detail to you. Sixteen days is the time assigned to a _queen_ for her existence in her preparatory states, before she is ready to emerge from her cell. Three she remains in the egg; when hatched she continues feeding five more; when covered in she begins to spin her cocoon, which occupies another day: as if exhausted by this labour, she now remains perfectly still for two days and sixteen hours; and then assumes the pupa, in which state she remains exactly four days and eight hours--making in all the period I have just named. A longer time, by four days, is required to bring the _workers_ to perfection; their preparatory states occupying twenty days, and those of the _male_ even twenty-four. The former consumes half a day more than the queen in spinning its cocoon,--a circumstance most probably occasioned by a singular difference in the structure and dimensions of this envelope, which I shall explain to you presently. Thus you see that the peculiar circumstances which change the form and functions of a bee, accelerate its appearance as a perfect insect; and that by choosing a grub three days old, when the bees want a queen, they actually gain six days; for in this case she is ready to come forth in ten days, instead of sixteen, which would be required, was a recently laid egg fixed upon[158].

The larvæ of bees, though without feet, are not altogether without motion. They advance from their first station at the bottom of the cell, as I before hinted, in a spiral direction. This movement, for the first three days, is so slow as to be scarcely perceptible; but after this it is more easily discerned. The animal now makes two entire revolutions in about an hour and three quarters; and when the period of its metamorphosis arrives, it is scarcely more than two lines from the mouth of the cell. Its attitude, which is always the same, is a strong curve[159]. This occasions the inhabitant of a horizontal cell to be always perpendicular to the horizon, and that of a vertical one to be parallel with it.

A most remarkable difference, as I lately observed, takes place in spinning their cocoons,--the grubs of workers and drones spinning complete cocoons, while those that are spun by the females are incomplete, or open at the lower end, and covering only the head and trunk and the first segment of the abdomen. This variation is probably occasioned by the different forms of the cells; for, if a female larva be placed in a worker's cell, it will spin a complete cocoon; and, _vice versâ_, if a worker larva be placed in a royal cell, its cocoon will be incomplete[160]. No provision of the Great Author of nature is in vain. In the present instance, the fact which we are considering is of great importance to the bees; for, were the females wholly covered by the thick texture of a cocoon, their destruction by their rival competitors for the throne could not so readily be accomplished; they either would not be able to reach them with their stings, or the stings might be detained by their barbs in the meshes of the cocoon, so that they would not be able to disengage them. On the use of this instinctive and murderous hatred of their rivals I shall soon enlarge.

When our young prisoners are ready to emerge, they do not, like the ants, require the assistance of the workers, but themselves eat through the cocoon and the cell that incloses it. By a wise provision, which prevents the injury or destruction of a cell, they generally make their way through the cover or lid with which the workers had shut it up; though sometimes, but not often, a female will break through the side of her prison.

Having thus shown you our little chemists in their preparatory states, and carried you from the egg to the cocoon, both of which may be deemed a kind of cradle, in which they are nursed to fit them for two very different conditions of existence, I must now introduce you to a scene more interesting and diversified; in which all their wonderful instincts are displayed in full action, and we see them exceed some of the most vaunted products of human wisdom, art, and skill.

* * * * *

The _queen-mother_ here demands our first attention, as the personage upon whom, when established in her regal dignity, the welfare and happiness of the apiarian community altogether depend. I shall begin my history with the events that befall her on her quitting the royal cradle and appearing in the perfect state. And here you will find that the first moments of her life, prior to her election to lead a swarm or fill a vacant throne, are moments of the greatest uneasiness and vexation, if not of extreme peril and vindictive and mortal warfare. The Homeric maxim, that "the government of many is not good[161]," is fully adopted and rigorously adhered to in these societies. The jealous Semiramis of the hive will bear no rival near her throne. There are usually not less than sixteen, and sometimes not less than twenty, royal cells in the same nest; you may therefore conceive what a sacrifice is made when one only is suffered to live and to reign. But here a distinction obtains which should not be overlooked: in some instances a single queen only is wanted to govern her native hive; in others several are necessary to lead the swarms. In the first case, inevitable death is the lot of all but one; in the other, as many as are wanted are preserved from destruction by the precautions taken on that occasion, under the direction of an all-wise Providence, by the workers.

I shall enlarge a little on each of these cases. In the formicary, as we have seen, rival queens live together very harmoniously without molesting each other: but there is that instinctive jealousy in a queen bee, that no sooner does she discover the existence of another in the hive, than she is put into a state of the most extreme agitation, and is not easy until she has attacked and destroyed her.

Naturalists had observed, that when there were two queens in the same hive, one of them soon perished; but some supposed (this was the opinion of Schirach and Riem) that the workers destroyed the supernumeraries. Reaumur, however, conjectured that these queens attacked each other; and his conjecture has been since confirmed by the actual observation of other naturalists. Blassiere, the translator of Schirach, tells us, as what he had himself witnessed, that the strongest queen kills her rival with her sting; and the same is asserted by Huber, whose opportunities of observation were greater than those of any of his precursors[162].

The queen that is first liberated from her confinement, and has assumed the perfect or imago state (it is to be supposed that the author is here speaking of a hive which has lost the old queen), soon after this event goes to visit the royal cells that are still inhabited. She darts with fury upon the first with which she meets; by means of her jaws she gnaws a hole large enough to introduce the end of her abdomen, and with her sting, before the included female is in a condition to defend herself or resist her attack, she gives her a mortal wound. The workers, who remain passive spectators of this assassination, after she quits the victim of her jealousy, enlarge the breach that she has made, and drag forth the carcase of a queen just emerged from the thin membrane that envelopes the pupa. If the object of her attack be still in the pupa state, she is stimulated by a less violent degree of rage, and contents herself with making a breach in the cell: when this happens, the death of the inclosed insect is equally certain, for the workers enlarge the breach, pull it out, and it perishes[163]. If it happens, as it sometimes does, that two queens are disclosed at the same time, the care of Providence to prevent the hive from being wholly despoiled of a governor is singularly manifested by a remarkable trait in their instinct, which, when mutual destruction seems inevitable, makes them separate from each other as if panic-struck. "Two young queens," says M. Huber, "left their cells one day, almost at the same moment;--as soon as they came within sight, they darted upon each other, as if inflamed by the most ungovernable anger, and placed themselves in such an attitude, that the antennæ of each were held by the jaws of its antagonist; head was opposed to head, trunk to trunk, abdomen to abdomen; and they had only to bend the extremity of the latter, and they would have fallen reciprocal victims to each other's sting." But nature having decreed that these duels should not be fatal to both combatants, as soon as they were thus circumstanced a panic fear seemed to strike them, and they disengaged themselves, and each fled away. After a few minutes were expired, the attack was renewed in a similar manner with the same issue; till at last one suddenly seizing the other by her wing, mounted upon her and inflicted a mortal wound[164].

The combats I have here described to you took place between virgin queens; but M. Huber found that those which had been impregnated were actuated by the same animosity, and attacked royal cells with a fury equally destructive. When another fertile queen had been introduced into this hive, a singular scene ensued, which proves how well aware the workers are that they cannot prosper with two sovereigns. Soon after she was introduced, a circle of bees was formed round the stranger, not to compliment her on her arrival, or pay her the usual homage, but to confine her, and prevent her escape; for they insensibly agglomerated themselves in such numbers round her, and hemmed her in so closely, that in about a minute she was completely a prisoner. While this was transacting, what was equally remarkable, other workers assembled in clusters round the legitimate queen, and impeded all her motions; so that soon she was not more at liberty than the intruder. It seemed as if the bees foresaw the combat that was to ensue between the two rivals, and were impatient for the event; for they only confined them when they appeared to avoid each other. To witness the homage, respect and love that they usually manifest to their lawful ruler; the anxiety concerning her which they often exhibit: and the distrust which for a time (as we shall see hereafter) they usually show towards strange ones even when deprived of their own; one would expect that, rather than permit such a perilous combat, they would unite in the defence of their sovereign, and cause the interloper to perish under the stroke of their fatal stings. But no; the contest for empire must be between the rival candidates: no worker must interfere in any other way than that which I have described; no contending armies must fight the battles of their sovereigns, for the law of succession seems to be "_detur fortiori_." But to return to my narrative. The legitimate queen appearing inclined to move towards that part of the comb on which her rival was stationed, the bees immediately began to retire from the space that intervened between them, so that there was soon a clear arena for the combat. When they could discern each other, the rightful queen rushing furiously upon the pretender, seized her with her jaws near the root of the wings, and, after fixing her without power of motion against the comb, with one stroke of her sting dispatched her. If ever-so-many queens are introduced into a hive, all but one will perish, and that one will have won the throne by her own unassisted valour and strength. Sometimes a strange queen attempts of herself to enter a hive: in this case the workers, who are upon the watch and who examine every thing that presents itself, immediately seize her with their jaws by the legs or wings, and hem her in so straitly with a clustered circle of guards, turning their heads on all sides towards her, that it is impossible for her to penetrate within. If they retain her prisoner too long, she dies either from the want of food or air, but never from their stings[165].

Here you may perhaps feel curious to know, supposing the reigning queen to die or be killed, and the bees to have discovered their loss, whether they would then receive a foreigner that offers herself to them or is introduced amongst them. Reaumur says they would do this immediately[166]; but Huber, who had better means of observing them, and studied them with more undivided attention, affirms that this will not be the case, unless twenty-four hours have elapsed since the death of the old queen. Previously to this period, as if they were absorbed by grief at their calamity, or indulged a fond hope of her revival, an intruder would be treated exactly as I have described. But when the period just mentioned is passed, they will receive any queen that is presented to them with the customary homage, and she may occupy the vacant throne[167].

I must now beg you to attend to what takes place in the second case that I mentioned, where queens are wanted to lead forth swarms. Here you will, with reason, suppose that nature has instilled some instinct into the bees, by which these necessary individuals are rescued from the fury of the reigning sovereign.

Did the old queen of the hive remain in it till the young ones were ready to come forth, her instinctive jealousy would lead her to attack them all as successively produced; and being so much older and stronger, the probability is that she would destroy them; in which case there could be no swarms, and the race would perish. But this is wisely prevented by a circumstance which invariably takes place--that the first swarm is conducted by this queen, and not by a newly disclosed one, as Reaumur and others have supposed. Previously to her departure, after her great laying of male eggs in the month of May, she oviposits in the royal cells when about three or four lines in length, which the workers have in the mean time constructed. These however are not all furnished in one day,--a most essential provision, in consequence of which the queens come forth successively, in order to lead successive swarms. There is something singular in the manner in which the workers treat the young queens that are to lead the swarms. After the cells are covered in, one of their first employments is to remove here and there a portion of the wax from their surface, so as to render it unequal; and immediately before the last metamorphosis takes place, the walls are so thin that all the motions of the inclosed pupa are perceptible through them. On the seventh day the part covering the head and trunk of the young female, if I may so speak, is almost entirely unwaxed. This operation of the bees facilitates her exit, and probably renders the evaporation of the superabundant fluids of the body of the pupa more easy.

You will conclude, perhaps, when all things are thus prepared for the coming forth of the inclosed female, that she will quit her cell at the regular period, which is seven days:--but you would be mistaken. Were she indeed permitted to pursue her own inclinations, this would be the case: but here the bees show how much they are guided in their instinct by circumstances and the wants of their society; for did the new queen leave her cell, she would immediately attack and destroy those in the other cells; a proceeding which they permit, as I have before stated, when they only want a successor to a defunct or a lost sovereign. As soon therefore as the workers perceive--which the transparency of the cell permits them to do--that the young queen has cut circularly through her cocoon, they immediately solder the cleft up with some particles of wax, and so keep her a prisoner against her will. Upon this, as if to complain of such treatment, she emits a distinct sound, which excites no pity in the breasts of her subjects, who detain her a prisoner two days longer than nature has assigned for her confinement. In the interim, she sometimes thrusts her tongue through the cleft she has made, drawing it in and out till she is noticed by the workers, to make them understand that she is in want of food. Upon perceiving this they give her honey, till her hunger being satisfied she draws her tongue back--upon which they stop the orifice with wax[168].

You may think it perhaps extraordinary that the workers should thus endeavour to retard the appearance of their young females beyond its natural limit; but when I explain to you the reason for this seeming incongruity of instinct, you will adore the wisdom that implanted it. Were a queen permitted to leave her cell as soon as the natural term for it arrived, it would require some time to fit her for flight, and to lead forth a swarm; during which interval a troublesome task would be imposed upon the workers, who must constantly detain her a prisoner to prevent her from destroying her rivals, which would require the labours and attention of a much larger number than are necessary to keep her confined to her cell. On this account they never suffer her to come forth till she is perfectly fit to take her flight. When at length she is permitted to do this, if she approaches the other royal cells, the workers on guard seem greatly irritated against her, and pull and bite and chase her away; and she enjoys tranquillity only while she keeps at a distance from them. As her instinct is constantly urging her to attack them, this proceeding is frequently repeated. Sometimes standing in a particular and commanding attitude, she utters that authoritative sound which so much affects the bees; they then all hang down their heads and remain motionless; but as soon as it ceases, they resume their opposition. At last she becomes violently agitated, and communicating her agitation to others, the confusion more and more increases, till a swarm leaves the hive, which she either precedes or follows. In the same manner the other young queens are treated while there are swarms to go forth; but when the hive is sufficiently thinned, and it becomes troublesome to guard them in the manner here described, they come forth unnoticed, and fight unimpeded till one alone remains to fill the deserted throne of the parent hive.--You see here the reason why the eggs that produce these queens are not laid at the same time, but after some interval, that they may come forth successively. For did they all make their appearance together, it would be a much more laborious and difficult task to keep them from destroying each other.

When the bees thus delay the entrance of the young queens into their world, they invariably let out the oldest first; and they probably know their progress to maturity by the emission of the sound lately mentioned. The accurate Huber took the trouble to mark all the royal cells in a hive as soon as the workers had covered them in, and he found that they were all liberated according to seniority. Those first covered first emit the sound, and so on successively; whence he conjectures that this is the sign by which the workers discover their age. As their captivity, however, is sometimes prolonged to eight or ten days, this circumstance in that time may be forgotten. In this case he supposes that their tones grow stronger as they grow older, by which the workers may be enabled to distinguish them. It is remarkable that no guard is placed round the mute queens bred according to the Lusatian method, which, when the time for their appearance is come, are not detained in captivity a single moment; but, as you have heard, are left to fight, conquer, or die[169].

You must not think, however, from what I have been saying, that the old queen never destroys the young ones previously to her leading forth the earliest swarm. She is allowed the most uncontrolled liberty of action; and if she chooses to approach and destroy the royal cells, her subjects do not oppose her. It sometimes happens, when unfavourable weather retards the first swarm, that all the royal progeny perishes by the sting of their mother, and then no swarm takes place. It is to be observed that she never attacks a royal cell till its inhabitant is ready to assume the pupa, therefore much will depend upon their age. When they arrive at this state, her horror of these cells, and aversion to them, are extreme: she attacks, perhaps, and destroys several; but finding it too laborious, for they are often numerous, to destroy the whole, the same agitation is caused in her as if she were forcibly prevented, and she becomes disposed to depart, rather than remain in the midst of her rivals, though her own offspring.

But though the bees, in one of these cases, appear such unconcerned spectators of the destruction of royal personages, or rather, the applauders and inciters of the bloody fact; and in the other show little respect to them, put such a restraint upon their persons, and manifest such disregard to their wishes; yet when they are once acknowledged as governors of the hive, and leaders of the colony, their instinct assumes a new and wonderful direction. From this moment they become the "_publica cura_," the objects of constant and universal attention; and wherever they go, are greeted by a homage which evinces the entire devotion of their subjects. You seemed amused and interested in no slight degree by what I related in a former letter of the marked respect paid by the ants to their females[170]: but this will bear no comparison with that shown by the inhabitants of the hive to their queen. She appears to be the very soul of all their actions, and the centre of their instincts. When they are deprived of her, or of the means of replacing her, they lose all their activity, and pursue no longer their daily labours. In vain the flowers tempt them with their nectar and ambrosial dust: they collect neither; they elaborate no wax, and build no cells; they scarcely seem to exist; and, indeed, would soon perish, were not the means of restoring their monarch put within their reach. But, if a small piece of comb containing the brood grubs of workers be given to them, all seem endued with new life: their instincts revive; they immediately set about building royal cells; they feed with their appropriate food the grubs they have selected, and every thing proceeds in the usual routine. Virgil has described this attachment of the bees to their sovereign with great truth and spirit in the following lines:

"Lydian nor Mede so much his king adores, Nor those on Nilus' or Hydaspes' shores: The state united stands while he remains, But should he fall, what dire confusion reigns! Their waxen combs and honey, late their joy, With grief and rage distracted, they destroy: He guards the works, with awe they him surround, And crowd about him with triumphant sound; Him frequent on their duteous shoulders bear, Bleed, fall, and die for him in glorious war."

M. Huber thus describes the consequences of the loss of a queen.--When the queen is removed from a hive, at first the bees seem not to perceive it, their order and tranquillity not being disturbed, and their labours proceeding as usual. About an hour after her departure, inquietude begins to manifest itself amongst them; the care of the young brood no longer engages their attention, and they run here and there, as if in great agitation. This agitation, however, is at first confined to a small portion of the community. The bees that are first sensible of their loss meet with others, they mutually cross their antennæ, and strike them lightly. By this action they appear to communicate the sad intelligence to those who receive the blow, who in their turn impart it in the same way to others. Disorder and confusion increase rapidly, till the whole population is in a tumult. Then the workers may be seen running over the combs, and against each other; impetuously rushing to the entrance and quitting the hive; from thence they spread themselves all around, they re-enter, and go out again and again. The hum in the hive becomes very loud, and increases the tumult, which lasts two or three hours, rarely four or five: they then return and resume their wonted care of the young; and if the hive be visited twenty-four hours after the departure of the queen, it will be seen that they have taken steps to repair their loss by filling some of the cells with a larger quantity of jelly than is the usual portion of common larvæ; which however is intended, it seems, not for the food of the inhabitant, but for a cushion to elevate it, since it is found unconsumed in the cell when the grub has descended into the pyramidal habitation afterwards prepared for it[171].

If, after being removed, their old queen is restored to the hive, they instantly recognise her, and pay her the usual attentions; but if a strange one be introduced within the first twelve hours after the old one is lost, she is kept a close prisoner till she perishes: if twenty-four hours, as I have before hinted, have expired since they lost their queen, and you introduce a new one, at the moment you set this stranger upon a comb, the workers that are near her first touch her with their antennæ, and then pass their proboscis over all parts of her body: place is next given to others, who salute her in the same manner:--all then beat their wings at the same time, and range themselves in a circle round their new sovereign. A kind of agitation is now communicated to the whole surface of the comb, which brings all the bees upon it to see what is going forward. This may be called the first shout of the applauding multitude to welcome the arrival of their new sovereign. The circle of courtiers increases, they vibrate their wings and bodies, but without tumult, as if their sensations were very agreeable. When she begins to move, the circle opens to let her pass, and all follow her steps. She is received with similar demonstrations of loyalty in the other parts of the hive, is soon acknowledged queen by all, and begins to lay eggs.--Reaumur put some bees into a hive without their queen, and then introduced to them one that he had taken when half perished with cold, and kept in a box, in which she had covered herself with powder. The bees immediately owned her for their queen, employed themselves very anxiously in cleaning her and warming her, sometimes turning her upon her back for this purpose--and then began to construct cells in their new habitation[172]. Even when the bees have got young brood, have built or are building royal cells, and are engaged in feeding these hopes of their hive, knowing that their great aim is already accomplished, they cease all these employments when this intruder comes amongst them.

With regard to the ordinary attention and homage that they pay to their sovereigns--the bees do more than respect their queen, says Reaumur, they are constantly on the watch to make themselves useful to her, and to render her every kind office; they are for ever offering her honey; they lick her with their proboscis, and whereever she goes she has a court to attend upon her[173]. It may here be observed, that the stimulant which excites the bees to these acts of homage is the pregnant state of their queen, and her fitness to maintain the population of the hive; all they do being with a view to the public good: for while she remains a virgin she is treated with the utmost indifference, which is exchanged, as soon as impregnation has taken place, for the above marks of attachment[174].

The instinct of the bees, however, does not always enable them to distinguish a partially fertile queen from one that is universally so. What I mean is this--A queen, whose impregnation is retarded beyond the twenty-eighth day of her whole existence, lays only male eggs, which are of no use whatever to the community, unless they are at the same time provided with a sufficient supply of workers. Yet even a queen of this description, and sometimes one that is entirely sterile, is treated by them with the same respect and homage as a fertile one. This seems to evince an amiable feeling in these creatures, attachment to the person as well as to the functions of the sovereign; which is further manifested by their unwillingness at first to receive a new sovereign upon the loss or death of their old one. Nay, this respect is sometimes shown to the carcase of a defunct queen, which Huber assures us he has seen bees treat with the same attention that they had shown her when alive; for a long time preferring her inanimate corpse to the fertile queens that he offered to them[175]. He attributes this to some agreeable sensation which they experience from their queens, independent of their fecundity. But since virgin queens, as we have seen, do not excite it, more probably it is a remnant of their former attachment, first excited by her fecundity, and afterwards strengthened and continued by habit.

I may here introduce an interesting anecdote related by Reaumur, which strongly marks the attachment of bees to their queen when apparently lifeless. He took one out of the water quite motionless, and seemingly dead, which had lost part of one of its legs. Bringing it home, he placed it amongst some workers that he had found in the same situation, most of which he had revived by means of warmth; some however still being in as bad a state as the poor queen. No sooner did these revived workers perceive the latter in this wretched condition, than they appeared to compassionate her case, and did not cease to lick her with their tongues till she showed signs of returning animation; which the bees no sooner perceived, than they set up a general hum, as if for joy at the happy event. All this time they paid no attention to the workers who were in the same miserable state[176].

On a former occasion I have mentioned the laying of the eggs by the queen[177]; but as I did not then at all enlarge upon it, I shall now explain the process more in detail. In a subsequent letter I shall notice, what has so much puzzled learned apiarists--her fecundation: which is now ascertained beyond contradiction, from the observations of M. Huber, to take place in the open air, and to be followed by the death of the unfortunate male[178]. It is to be recollected that, from September to April, generally speaking, there are no males in the hives; yet during this period the queen often oviposits: a former fecundation, therefore, must fertilize all the eggs laid in this interval. The impregnation, in order to ensure complete fertility, must not be too long retarded: for, as I before observed, if this be delayed beyond the twenty-eighth day of her existence, her ovaries become so vitiated, that she can no longer lay eggs that will produce workers, but can only furnish the hive with a male population; which, however high a privilege it may be accounted amongst men, is the reverse of it amongst the bees. When this is the case, the abdomen of the queen becomes so enlarged that she is no longer able to fly[179]; and, what is remarkable, she loses that instinctive animosity which stimulates the fertile ones to attack their rivals[180]. Thus she seems to own that she is not equal to the duties of her station, and can tolerate another to discharge them in her room. When we consider how much virgin queens are slighted by their subjects, we may suppose that nature urges them to take the opportunity of the first warm day, when the males fly forth, to pair with one of them.

When fecundation has not been retarded, forty-six hours after it has taken place, the queen begins to lay eggs that will produce workers, and continues for the subsequent eleven months, more or less, to lay them solely; and it is only after this period that an uninterrupted laying of male eggs commences.--But when it has been retarded, after the same number of hours she begins laying male eggs, and continues to produce these alone during her whole life. From hence it should seem to follow, that the former kind of eggs are first in the oviducts, and, if impregnation be not effected within a given time, that all the worker embryos perish. Yet how this can take place with respect to those that in a fertile queen should succeed the laying of male eggs, or be produced in the second year of her life, seems difficult to conceive;--or how the male embryos escape this fate, which destroys all the female, both those that are to precede them and those that are to follow them. Is it impossible that the sex of the embryo may be determined by the period at which the _aura seminalis_ vivifies it, and by the state of the ovary at that time? In one state of the ovary this principle may cause the embryos to become workers, in another males. And something of this kind perhaps may be the cause of hermaphrodites in other animals. But this I give merely as conjecture[181]: the truth seems enveloped in mystery that we cannot yet penetrate. Huber is of opinion that a single impregnation fertilizes all the eggs that a queen will produce during her whole life, which is sometimes more than two years[182]. But of this enough.

I said that forty-six hours after impregnation the queen begins laying worker eggs;--this is not, however, invariable. When her impregnation takes place late in the year, she does not begin laying till the following spring. Schirach asserts, that in one season a single female will lay from 70,000 to 100,000 eggs[183]. Reaumur says, that upon an average she lays about two hundred in a day, a moderate swarm consisting of 12,000, which are laid in two months; and Huber, that she lays above a hundred. All these statements, the observations being made in different climates, and perhaps under different circumstances, may be true. The laying of worker eggs begins in February, sometimes so early as January[184]. After this, in the spring, the great laying of male eggs commences, lasting thirty days; in which time about 2000 of these eggs are laid. Another laying of them, but less considerable, takes place in autumn. In the season of oviposition, the queen may be discerned traversing the combs in all directions with a slow step, and seeking for cells proper to receive her eggs. As she walks she keeps her head inclined, and seems to examine, one by one, all the cells she meets with. When she finds one to her purpose, she immediately gives to her abdomen the curve necessary to enable it to reach the orifice of the cell, and to introduce it within it. The eggs are set in the angle of the pyramidal bottom of the cell, or in one of the hollows formed by the conflux of the sides of the rhombs, and, being besmeared with a kind of gluten, stand upright. If, however, it be a female that lays only male eggs, they are deposited upon the lowest of the sides of the cell, as she is unable to reach the bottom[185].

While our prolific lady is engaged in this employment, her court consists of from four to twelve attendants, which are disposed nearly in a circle, with their heads turned towards her. After laying from two to six eggs, she remains still, reposing for eight or nine minutes. During this interval the bees in her train redouble their attentions, licking her fondly with their tongues. Generally speaking, she lays only one egg in a cell; but when she is pressed, and there are not cells enough, from two to four have been found in one. In this case, as if they were aware of the consequences, the provident workers remove all but one. From an experiment of Huber's, it appears that the instinct of the queen invariably directs her to deposit worker eggs in worker cells; for when he confined one, during her course of laying worker eggs, where she could only come at male cells, she refused to oviposit in them; and trying in vain to make her escape, they at length dropped from her; upon which the workers devoured them. Retarded queens, however, lose this instinct, and often, though they lay only male eggs, oviposit in worker cells and even in royal ones. In this latter case the workers themselves act as if they suffered in their instinct from the imperfect state of their queen; for they feed these male larvæ with royal jelly, and treat them as they would a real queen. Though male eggs deposited in worker cells produce small males, their education in a royal cell with "royal dainties" adds nothing to their ordinary dimensions[186].

The _swarming_ of bees is a very curious and interesting subject, to which, since a female is the _sine quâ non_ on this occasion, I may very properly call your attention here. You will recollect that I said something upon the principle of emigrations, when I was amusing you with the history of ants[187]; but the object with them seems to be merely a change of station for one more convenient or less exposed to injury, and not to diminish a superabundant population. Whereas in the societies of the hive-bee, the latter is the general cause of emigrations, which invariably take place every year, if their numbers require it; if not, when the male eggs are laid, no royal cells are constructed, and no swarm is led forth. What might be the case with ants, were they confined to hives, we cannot say. Formicaries in general are capable of indefinite enlargement, therefore want of room does not cause emigration;--but bees being confined to a given space, which they possess not the means of enlarging,--to avoid the ill effects resulting from being too much crowded, when their population exceeds a certain limit, they must necessarily emigrate. Sometimes--for instance, when wasps have got into a hive--the bees will leave it, in order to fly from an inconvenience or enemy which they cannot otherwise avoid; but it does not very often happen that they wholly desert a hive.

Apiarists tell us that, in this country, the best season for swarming is from the middle of May to the middle of June; but swarms sometimes occur so early as the beginning of April, and as late as the middle of August[188]. The first swarm, as I before observed, is led by the reigning queen, and takes place when she is so much reduced in size, in consequence of the number of eggs she has laid, (for previously to oviposition her gravid body is so heavy that she can scarcely drag it along,) as to enable her to fly with ease. The most indubitable sign that a hive is preparing to swarm,--so says Reaumur,--is when on a sunny morning, the weather being favourable to their labours, few bees go out of a hive, from which on the preceding day they had issued in great numbers, and little pollen is collected. This circumstance, he observes, must be very embarrassing to one who attempts to explain all their proceedings upon principles purely mechanical. Does it not prove, he asks, that all the inhabitants of a hive, or almost all, are aware of a project that will not be put in execution before noon, or some hours later? For why should bees, who worked the day before with so much activity, cease their labours in a habitation which they are to quit at noon, were they not aware that they should soon abandon it[189]? The appearance of the males, and the clustering of the population at the mouth of the hive, (though this last is less to be relied upon, being often occasioned by extreme heat,) are also indications of the approach of this event. A good deal depends, however, on the warmth of the atmosphere and the state of the weather either to accelerate or retard it. Another sign is a general hum in the evening, which is continued even during the night,--all seems to be in a bustle, the greatest restlessness agitates the bees. Sometimes to hear this hum the ear must be placed close to the hive, when clear and sharp sounds may be distinguished, which appear to be produced by the vibration of the wings of a single bee. This hum by some has been gravely construed into an harangue of the queen to animate her subjects to the great undertaking which she now meditates--the founding of a new empire. There sometimes seem to happen suddenly amongst them, says Reaumur, events which put all the bees in motion, for which no account can be given. If you observe a hive with attention, you may often remain a long time and hear only a slight murmur, and then, all in a moment, a sonorous hum will be excited, and the workers, as if seized with a panic terror, may be seen quitting their various labours, and running off in different directions. At these moments if a young queen goes out, she will be followed by a numerous troop.

Huber has given a very lively and interesting account of the interior proceedings of the hive on this occasion. The queen, as soon as she began to exhibit signs of agitation, no longer laid her eggs with order as before, but irregularly, as if she did not know what she was about. She ran over the bees in her way; they in their turn struck her with their antennæ, and mounted upon her back; none offered her honey, but she helped herself to it from the cells in her path. The usual homage of a court attending round her was no longer paid. Those however that were excited by her motions followed her, rousing such as were still tranquil upon the combs. She soon had traversed the whole hive, when the agitation became general. The workers, now no longer attentive to the young brood, ran about in all directions; even those that returned from foraging, before the agitation was at its height, no sooner entered the hive than they participated in these tumultuous movements, and, neglecting to free themselves from the masses of pollen on their hind legs, ran wildly about. At length there was a general rush to the outlets of the hive, which the queen accompanied, and the swarm took place[190].

It is to be observed that this agitation, excited by the queen, increases the customary heat of the hive to a very high temperature, which the action of the sun augments till it becomes intolerable, and which often causes the bees accumulated near the mouth of the hive to perspire so copiously, that those near the bottom, who support the weight of the rest, appear drenched with the moisture. This intolerable heat determines the most irresolute to leave the hive. Immediately before the swarming, a louder hum than usual is heard, many bees take flight, and, if the queen be at their head, or soon follows them, in a moment the rest rise in crowds after her into the air, and the element is filled with bees as thick as the falling snow. The queen at first does not alight upon the branch on which the swarm fixes; but as soon as a group is formed and clustered, she joins it: after this it thickens more and more, all the bees that are in the air hastening to their companions and their queen, so as to form a living mass of animals supporting themselves upon each by the claws of their feet. Thus they sometimes are so concatenated, each bee suspending its legs to those of another, as to form living chaplets[191]. After this they soon become tranquil, and none are seen in the air. Before they are housed they often begin to construct a little comb on the branch on which they alight[192]. Sometimes it happens that two queens go out with the same swarm; and the result is, that the swarm at first divides into two bodies, one under each leader; but as one of these groups is generally much less numerous than the other, the smallest at last joins the largest, accompanied by the queen to whom they had attached themselves; and, when they are hived, this unfortunate candidate for empire falls sooner or later a victim to the jealousy of her rival. Till this great question is decided, the bees do not settle to their usual labours.[192] If no queen goes out with a swarm, they return to the hive from whence they came.

As in regular monarchies, so in this of the bees, the first-born is probably the fortunate candidate for the throne. She is usually the most active and vigorous; the most able to take flight; and in the best condition to lay eggs. Though the queen that is victorious, and mounts the throne, is not, as Virgil asserts, resplendent with gold and purple, and her rival hideous, slothful and unwieldy[193], yet some differences are observable; the successful candidate is usually redder and larger than the others; these last, upon dissection, appear to have no eggs ready for laying, while the former, which is a powerful recommendation, is usually full of them. Eggs are commonly found in the cells twenty-four hours after swarming, or at the latest two or three days.

You may think, perhaps, that the bees which emigrate from the parent hive are the youth of the colony; but this is not the case, for bees of all ages unite to form the swarms. The numbers of which they consist vary much. Reaumur calls 12,000 a moderate swarm; and he mentions one which amounted to more than three times that number (40,000). A swarm seldom or never takes place except when the sun shines and the air is calm. Sometimes, when every thing seems to prognosticate swarming, a cloud passing over the sun calms the agitation; and afterwards, upon his shining forth again, the tumult is renewed, keeps augmenting, and the swarm departs[194]. On this account the confinement of the queens, before related, is observed to be more protracted in bad weather.

The longest interval between the swarms is from seven to nine days, which usually is the space that intervenes between the first and the second. The next flies sooner, and the last sometimes departs the day after that which preceded it. Fifteen or eighteen days, in favourable weather, are usually sufficient for throwing the four swarms. The old queen, when she takes flight with the first swarm, leaves plenty of brood in the cells, which soon renew the population[195].

It is not without example, though it rarely happens, that a swarm conducted by the old queen increases so much in the space of three weeks as to send forth a new colony. Being already impregnated, she is in a condition to oviposit as soon as there are cells ready to receive her eggs: and an all-wise Providence has so ordered it, that at this time she lays only such as produce workers. And it is the first employment of her subjects to construct cells for this purpose[196]. The young queens that conduct the secondary swarms usually pair the day after they are settled in their new abode; when the indifference with which their subjects have hitherto treated them is exchanged for the usual respect and homage.

We may suppose that one motive with the bees for following the old queen, is their respect for her; but the reasons that induce them to follow the virgin queens, to whom they not only appear to manifest no attachment, but rather the reverse, seem less easy to be assigned. Probably the high temperature of the hive during these times of tumultuous agitation may be the principal cause that operates upon them. In a populous hive the thermometer commonly stands between 92° and 97°; but during the tumult that precedes swarming it rises above 104°, a heat intolerable to these animals[197]. This is M. Huber's opinion. Yet still, though a high temperature will well account for the departure of the swarm from the hive with a virgin queen, if there were really no attachment, (as he appears to think,) is it not extraordinary, that when this cause no longer operates upon them, they should agglomerate about her, as they always do, be unsettled and agitated without her, and quiet when she is with them? Is it not reasonable to suppose that the instinct which teaches them what is necessary for the preservation of their society,--at the same time that it shows them that without a queen that society cannot be preserved,--impells them in every case to the mode of treating her which will most effectually influence her conduct, and give it that direction which is most beneficial to the community?

Yet, with respect to the treatment of queens, instinct does not invariably direct the bees to this end. There are certain exceptions, produced perhaps by artificial or casual occurrences, in which it seems to deviate, yet as we should call it amiably, from the rule of the public advantage. Retarded queens, which, as I have observed, lay male eggs only, deposit them in all cells indifferently, even in royal ones. These last are treated by the workers as if they were actually to become queens. Here their instinct seems defective:--it appears unaccountable that they should know these eggs, as they do, when deposited in workers cells, and give them a convex covering when about to assume the pupa; unless, perhaps, the size of the larva directs them in this case.

The amputation of one of the antennæ of a queen bee appears not to affect her perceptibly; but cutting off both these important organs produces a very striking derangement of all her proceedings--She seems in a species of delirium, and deprived of all her instincts; every thing is done at random; yet the respect and homage of the workers towards her, though they are received by her with indifference, continue undiminished. If another in the same condition be put in the hive, the bees do not appear to discover the difference, and treat them both alike: but if a perfect one be introduced, even though fertile, they seize her, keep her in confinement, and treat her very unhandsomely. One may conjecture from this circumstance, that it is by those wonderful organs, the antennæ, that the bees know their own queen. If two mutilated queens meet, they show not the slightest symptom of resentment. While one of these continues in the hive, the workers never think of choosing another; but if she leaves it, they do not accompany her, probably because the heat is not increased by her putting them into the preparatory agitation[198].

I am, &c.

FOOTNOTES:

[125] _Apis_ **. e. l. K. Dr. Bevan has lately published a very interesting work on the _Honey Bee_, which the reader will do well to consult.

[126] VOL. I. 481.

[127] Judges xiv. 8, 9.

[128] See Aristot. _Hist. Animal._ l. v. c. 22. Virgil. _Georgic._ l. iv.; and Mouffet, 12--.

[129] Aristot. _ubi supr._ c. 21. _De Generat. Animal._ l. iii. c. 10, where there is some curious reasoning upon this subject.

[130] Bonnet, x. 199-- 236--.

[131] _Hist. Animal._ l. v. c. 22.

[132] _De Generat. Animal._ l. iii. c. 10.

[133] _Œuvr._ x. 194--.

[134] Bonnet, x. P. Huber in _Linn. Trans._ vi. 283. Reaumur (v. 373) observes that some queens are much larger than others; but he attributes this difference of their size to the state of the eggs in their body.

[135] As every reader is not aware of the differences of form, &c. that distinguish the females, males, and workers from each other (I have seen the male mistaken for a distinct species, and placed in a cabinet as _Apis lagopoda_, L.), I shall here subjoin a description of each.--

i. The _body_ of the _Female_ bee is considerably longer than that of either the drone or the worker. The prevailing colour in all three is the same, black or black-brown; but with respect to the female this does not appear to be invariably the case; for--not to insist upon Virgil's royal bees glittering with ruddy or golden spots and scales, where allowance must be made for poetic licence--Reaumur affirms, after describing some differences of colour in different individuals of this sex, that a queen may always be distinguished, both from the workers and males, by the colour of her body[136]. If this observation be restricted to the colour of some parts of her body, it is correct; but it will not apply to all generally (unless, as I suspect may be the case, by the term body he means the abdomen), for, in all that I have had an opportunity of examining, the prevailing colour, as I have stated it, is the same.

The _head_ is not larger than that of the workers; but the _tongue_ is shorter and more slender, with straighter _maxillæ_. The _mandibles_ are forficate, and do not jut out like theirs into a prominent angle; they are of the colour of pitch with a red tinge, and terminate in two teeth, the exterior being acute, and the interior blunt or truncated. The _labrum_ or upper-lip is fulvous; and the _antennæ_ are piceous.

In the _trunk_, the _tegulæ_ or scales that defend the base of the wings are rufo-piceous. The _wings_ reach only to the tip of the third abdominal segment. The _tarsi_ and the apex of the _tibiæ_ are rufo-fulvous. The posterior _tibiæ_ are plane above and covered with short adpressed hairs, having neither the _corbicula_ (or marginal fringe of hairs for carrying the masses of pollen) nor the _pecten_; and the posterior _plantæ_ have neither the brush formed of hairs set in striæ, nor the auricle at the base.

The _abdomen_ is considerably longer than the head and trunk taken together, receding from the trunk, elongato-conical, and rather sharp at the anus. The _dorsal_ segments are fulvous at the tip; covered with very short, pallid, and, in certain lights, shining adpressed hairs; the first segment being very short, and covered with longer hairs. The ventral segments, except the _anal_, which is black, are fulvescent or rufo-fulvous, and covered with soft longer hairs. The _vagina_ of the _spicula_ (commonly called the sting) is curved.

ii. The _Male_ bee, or drone, is quite the reverse of his royal paramour; his body being thick, short, and clumsy, and very obtuse at each extremity[137]. It is covered also, as to the _head_ and _trunk_, with dense hairs.

The _head_ is depressed and orbicular. The _tongue_ is shorter and more slender than that of the female; and the _mandibles_, though nearly of the same shape, are smaller. The _eyes_ are very large, meeting at the back part of the head. In the space between them are placed the _antennæ_ and _stemmata_. The former consist of fourteen joints, including the _radicle_, the fourth and fifth being very short and not easily distinguished.

The _trunk_ is large. The _wings_ are longer than the body. The _legs_ are short and slender. The _posterior tibiæ_ are long, club-shaped, and covered with inconspicuous hairs. The _posterior plantæ_ are furnished underneath with thick-set _scopulæ_, which they use to brush their bodies.

The _claw-joints_ are fulvescent.

The _abdomen_ is cordate, very short, being scarcely so long as the head and trunk together, consisting of seven segments, which are fulvous at their apex. The first segment is longer than any of the succeeding ones, and covered above with rather long hairs. The second and third dorsal segments are apparently naked; but under a triple lens, in a certain light, some adpressed hairs may be perceived;--the remaining ones are hairy, the three last being inflexed. The ventral segments are very narrow, hairy, and fulvous.

iii. The _body_ of the _Workers_ is oblong.

The _head_ triangular. The _mandibles_ are prominent, so as to terminate the head in an angle, toothless and forcipate. The _tongue_ and _maxillæ_ are long and incurved: the _labrum_ and _antennæ_ black.

In the _trunk_ the _tegulæ_ are black. The _wings_ extend only to the apex of the fourth segment of the abdomen. The _legs_ are all black, with the _digits_ only rather piceous. The posterior _tibiæ_ are naked above, exteriorly longitudinally concave, and interiorly longitudinally convex; furnished with lateral and recumbent hairs to form the _corbicula_, and armed at the end with the _pecten_. The upper surface of the _posterior plantæ_ resembles that of the _tibiæ_; underneath they are furnished with a _scopula_ or brush of stiff hairs set in rows: at the base they are armed with stiff bristles, and exteriorly with an acute appendage or _auricle_.

The _abdomen_ is a little longer than the head and trunk together; oblong, and rather heart-shaped--a transverse section of it is triangular. It is covered with longish flavo-pallid hairs: the first segment is short with longer hairs; the base of the three intermediate segments is covered, and as it were banded, with pale hairs. The apex of the three intermediate ventral segments is rather fulvescent, and their base is distinguished on each side by a trapeziform _wax-pocket_ covered by a thin membrane. The sting, or rather _vagina_ of the _spicula_, is straight.

[136] Reaumur, v. 375.

[137] Virgil seems to have regarded the drone as one of the sorts of kings or leaders of the bees, when he says, speaking of the latter,

"... Ille horridus alter Desidiâ, latamque trahens inglorius alvum." _Georgic_, iv. l. 93.

[138] See VOL. I. p. 486.

[139] In hives where a queen laying male eggs has been killed, the workers continue to make only male cells, though supplied with a fertile queen, and the fertile workers lay eggs in them. _Schirach_, 258.

[140] Huber, ii. 425--.

[141] Thorley, _On Bees_, 179.

[142] Huber, i. 137.

[143] Reaumur, who was however unacquainted with this extraordinary fact, has figured one of these cells, v. _t._ 32. _f._ 3. _h._

[144] Compare Bonnet, x. 156, with Huber, i. 134--.

[145] Schirach, 69.

[146] Huber, _t._ 4. _f._ 4-6.

[147] Huber, i. 292.

[148] Bonnet, x.

[149] Huber, i. 132.

[150] Schirach, 121.

[151] Huber, ii. 453.

[152] Bonner _On Bees_, 56.

[153] The same gentleman subsequently sent me the following memoranda.

July 10, 1820. A late second swarm was hived into a box constructed so that each comb could be taken out and examined separately. On the 7th of August the queen was removed, and each comb taken out and closely examined: there was not the least appearance of any royal cells, but much brood and eggs in the common ones. On the 14th, three royal cells were observed nearly finished, with a large grub in each. On the 16th, the three cells were sealed. On the 18th and 21st, they remained in the same state. On the 22d, two queens were found hatched, one was removed and the other left with the stock, the remaining royal cell being still closed. On the morning of the 23d, a dead queen was thrown out of the hive, upon which examination being made, the royal cell left closed on the 22d was found open, and a living queen in the stock which was allowed to remain.

[154] Huber, ii. 445.

[155] See J. Hunter's _Treatise on certain Parts of the Animal Œconomy_.

[156] _Philos. Trans._ 1792. viii. 167. Hunter _Treatise on certain Parts of the Animal Œconomy_, p. 65. Latham, _Synops._ ii. 672. _t._ 60.

[157] Reaum. v. 271--.

[158] Huber, i. 215--. Schirach asserts, that in cold weather the disclosure of the imago takes place two days later than in warm: and Riem, that in a bad season the eggs will remain in the cells many months without hatching. Schirach, 79. 241.

[159] Schirach, _t._ 3. _f._ 10.

[160] Huber, i. 224.

[161] Ουκ αγαθη ἡ πολυκοιρανιη, είς κοιρανος εςω.

[162] Schirach, 209, note *. Huber, i. 170--.

[163] Huber, i. 171--.

[164] Huber, i. 174.

[165] Huber, i. 186.

[166] Reaum. v. 268.

[167] Huber, i. 190.

[168] Huber, i. 256.

[169] Huber, i. 286.

[170] See above, p. 56.

[171] Huber, ii. 396--.

[172] Reaum. v. 262.

[173] Reaum. v. Pref. xv.

[174] Huber, i. 269.

[175] Huber, i. 322.

[176] Reaum. v. 265.

[177] VOL. I. 376--.

[178] Huber, i. 63--.

[179] Schirach, 257.

[180] Huber, i. 319--.

[181] This conjecture receives strong confirmation from the following observations of Sir E. Home, which I met with since it came into my mind. From the nipples present in man, which sometimes even afford milk, and from the general analogy between the male and female organs of generation, he supposes the germ is originally fitted to become either sex; and that which it shall be is determined at the time of impregnation by some unknown cause. _Philos. Trans._ 1799. 157.

[182] i. 106--.

[183] Schirach, 7. 13.

[184] Ibid. 13. Thorley, 105.

[185] Bonnet, x. 258, 8vo. ed.

[186] Huber, i. 122--.

[187] See above, p. 57.

[188] Keys _On Bees_, 76.

[189] Reaum. v. 611.

[190] Huber, i. 251.

[191] Some critics have found fault with Mr. Southey for ascribing, in his _Curse of Kehama_, to Camdeo, the Cupid of Indian mythology, a bow strung with bees. The idea is not so absurd as they imagine; and the poet doubtless was led to it by his knowledge of the natural history of these animals, and that they form themselves into strings or chaplets.--See Reaum. v. _t._ xxii. _f._ 3.

[192] Reaumur, 615-644.

[193]

"Alter erit maculis auro squalentibus ardens, (Nam duo sunt genera) hic melior, insignis et ore, Et rutilis clarus squamis: ille horridus alter Desidiâ, latamque trahens inglorius alvum." _Georg._ iv. 91--.

[194] Bees are generally thought to foresee the state of the weather: but they are not always right in their prognostics; for Reaumur witnessed a swarm, which after leaving the hive at half-past one o'clock were overtaken by a very heavy shower at three.

[195] Huber, i. 271.

[196] Huber, i. 305.

[197] Ibid. 280.

[198] Huber, i. 316.