BEE-spoke-data/bees-v0 huggingface dataset:
must begin to work. It is the lot of all, bees as well as men. Happily for the bees, they seem never to have any doubt, or to make any fuss, about their " emission," strange, and wonderful, and beautiful as are the operations they have to perform. To live, to know their work, and to do it, are with them convertible propositions. The larva now begins to line the cell with a silky film, alternately shortening and lengthening its body in the process. This silky thread proceeds from the middle part of the under lip, and is composed of two threads gummed together as they issue from the two adjoining orifices of the spinner. The larva then encloses itself in a cocoon, after the fashion of the silkworm, and looks not very unlike an Egyptian mummy in its swaddling-clothes. This process completed, in about thirty-six hours, it is no longer a larva, but a pupa or nymph. At last comes the hour of true birth, when the young image, as it is now called, shall breathe the pure air of the external world, and back in the rays of the golden sunshine. On the twenty-first day after the deposition of the eggs, the young ones, of a grayish colour, may occasionally be seen in front of the hive, undergoing the process of purification at the hands of the nurse-bees.
After the pupa-bee has passed through its various changes, its first movement towards entering its new state of existence, is to gnaw through the cover of the cell. This it does without much difficulty; but releasing itself from the cell is quite another matter, for the other bees do not give it the slightest assistance towards freeing itself from its embarrassments. An accurate observer has repeatedly seen an unfortunate bee, after many struggles, enabled to poke its head out of the cell, and look round upon the new world presented to its gaze, when just as it was on the point of forcing its shoulders out, a body of unfeeling worker-bees ran over it in the pursuit of their daily avocitions, and compelled the unfortunate insect to dive back into the cell from which it had so recently emerged. Again and again had the poor bee to retreat just as it had effected its escape, and not until after numerous interruptions of the same nature, were its persevering endeavours crowned with success. The nurse-bees pay the most unfortunate attention to the young bees, from the time that the error is latched until the cell is closed; out then they appear to think no more about the matter, and leave the infant bee to its fate with the most philosophical indifference. This only relates to worker-bees, for the nurses bees have repeatedly been seen to assist the drones, and their assiduity in attending on the young queens is quite as great at the time of their emerging as when they were first latched. Some days elapse before the young worker-bees and drones can fly. As to the queen, special provision is made, as we shall see presently.
The internal changes of the bee during this period are no less remarkable than the external changes, and are exceedingly interesting to the dissector. The tube, enormously large in the middle, and very small at each end, which at first formed the entire digestive system, gradually contracts in diameter; the part immediately behind the thorax begins to swell at one side, and is gradually changed into the honey-bag; the intestine first makes a small bend out of its straight course, then makes one twist, and then another, until the whole beautiful machinery is completed. In the Museum of Anatomy, at Oxford, is a complete series of dissections to illustrate the changes of the digestive organs. If any of my readers should wish to dissect bees for themselves, I would recommend them to begin with the humblebee, as its much greater size renders it easier to the unpractised dissector, and its internal anatomy is almost precisely the same as that of the queen live-bee. Queen-bees are too scarce to waste; but female humble-bees may be obtained any day. I do not know a more beautiful sight than a series of well-executed dissections of the humble-bee. By taking a nest they may be found in all stages, and a few weeks spent in careful examination and dissection (always taking care to sketch, if possible, any circumstance that seems remarkable) will give more real knowledge on the subject than reading a host of books. Few tools are requisite. A pair of Beale's dissecting scissors, a pair of fine forceps, a magnifying-glass, and a few needles, are all tile requisites. The insect should be fastened to a plate of eork loaded with lead, and sunk under water or spirit, from which it must never be removed, or the delicate organs, deprived of their original attachments, and burdened with the weight of water hanging upon them, will burst, and render all the labour of the operator useless.
The people thus rapidly coming into existence, where are its future governors? Watch the old queen as the spring advances, the period when all these changes are at their climax, and you will be more than ever astonished at the wondrous phenomena of the bee-mind. See how restlessly she runs about. Now she seems about to go on laying eggs; but hurriedly withdraws without doing so. No wonder she is agitated. She is about to abdicate; not about to lay down the cares and glory of sovereignty, certainly ; but about to quit her established, peaceable, and quiet kingdom, to go she knows not whither, with a part of her subjects, exposed to she knows not what accidents before she may again find herself by her comfortable, regal, warm comb (her fire) side. But she respects the laws of nature, and obeys them. In those cells which she runs over in so much agitation, lurks her successor, waiting but for the proper hour to ascend the throne. How easily she could tear open the cells and destroy her! But a power greater than ambition withholds her. The bees no longer pay her their usual attention. An idea of divided allegiance seems troubling them. They get as excited as their queen. Some terrible calamity--civil war, perhaps--imends. Oh, no! the bees are at once too sensible and too unselfish. They divide--perhaps take leave of each other affectionately--and off goes the first swarm, led by their reluctant but duty-obeying monarch.
The swarm does not go off at an early period of the day, or at a very late one, but generally starts from its parent hive between ten in the morning to three or four in the afternoon, although instances have been known of swarms starting as early as seven in the morning, and as late as five in the afternoon. This instinct is useful enough to the propriator who is anxiously expecting a swarm, as he need not commence his watch before seven or eight, and is released about four. It seems rather strange that the rightful queen should always go off with the swarm instead of remaining in office and sending the newly emancipated princess, if she may be so called, to take charge of the swarm. But so it is, and almost every queen-bee owes her throne to usurpation,and will in all probability, if she lives long enough, be dispossessed of it by the same means. She makes a terrible disturbance though, before she does set off; and were the bees possessed of reason, we might almost think that they left the hive for the sake of peace and quietness. At all events the old queen uses her experience to some purpose, for she will not leave her former kingdom unless the day is a very fine one. The succeeding swarms appear to pay less attention to the weather. The period of delightful coolness which succeeds a summer storm is a common time for the swarm to rise on the wing. If the bee-keeper thinks that the swarm is starting too soon, he can generally send it back into the hive, by gently sprinkling the cluster of bees as they hang out of the live, with water from a small watering-pot. The same means have been adopted to make the swarm alight where it was wanted, but as water cannot always be thrown high enough to reach a swarm on the wing, sand has been found sufficient for the purpose, and the bees, mistaking it for rain, come down at once and settle in some sheltered place. Some bee-keepers recommend firing a gun, which the bees may possibly mistake for thunder. It is a mistake to suppose that a number of swarms will make the lives richer, as a weak live will necessarily be a poor one, and in many cases the latter swarms are merely caused by the violent conduct of the young queens, who make such a disturbance in the hive that the bees attach themselves to one of them and leave the live to avoid these disturbances. Sometimes two or even more queens go with a swarm, in which case there is a battle royal when they arrive at their new residence. Sometimes, also, two swarms select the same spot for their resting place, when a flight is inevitable, but it is a general flight, and not confined to the queens only.
When the swarm has settled, an empty live should be placed under them, and the bough on which the bees are clustering sharply struck, when they will fall into the live, which should be immediately placed on a cloth spread on the ground, and the bees will soon ascend into the live, which should be previously sprinkled with sugar and ale, or smeared with honey on the inside.
If the swarm is too small to make a strong, live it will be Bees.
better to send it back again to its parent live. This can be done by searching for, and removing the queen, when the bees will generally return upon discovering their loss, or can at all events be taken to the door of the hive, when they will re-enter of their own accord. The proper weight of a swarm is from five to seven pounds, and all swarms under that weight should be united to others. If the weather is unfavourable after a new swarm is hived, it will be necessary to feed the bees until a change of weather enables them to seek food for themselves, as they have no food in store. Some bee-masters recommend that a newly hived swarm should always be fed for a few days.
But bees colonize--not merely emigrate. It is not merely the young surplus population that are compelled to go fortil, but, on the contrary, a mixture of bees of all ages, and, no doubt, of all conditions. They do not rush away from home careless of what becomes of them when abroad. They do not trust to bee-gossip of the advantages of this place, or the disadvantages of that; and find out too late how absurd they have been. No, they send out scouts to examine the face of the country, and make them proper reports. Would one could look at a few of the bee "'blue-books." As this fact of the scouts has been doubted by some of the bee-men, who seem to think the only way to understand these insects, is to think as meally as possible of their capacity, we may observe that the following cases are given by Dr. Bevan, on the authority of one of the most accurate and profound of observers, Mr. Knight, from a paper published in the _Philosophical Transactions_, in the form of a letter to Sir Joseph Banks. " On one occasion he observed from twenty to thirty bees paying daily visits to some decayed trees, about a mile distant from his garden; the bees appeared to be busily employed in examining the hollow parts, and particularly the dead knots around them, as if apprehensive of the knots admitting moisture. In about fourteen days these seeming surveys were followed by a large swarm from his apiary, which was watched the whole way, till it.alighted in one of these cavities. It was observed to journey nearly in a direct line from the apiary to the tree. On several similar occasions the bees selected that cavity which Mr. Knight thought best adapted to their use." He noticed at another time that a tree, after having been examined and apparently approved, was deserted in favour of a hive; a circumstance he attributes to long hereditary habits of domestication. That they do prefer such homes appears tolerably clear, for they will flock to them under unpromising circumstances, such, for instance, as the hive in question being strewed over with dead bees. But probably the bees know perfectly well how to estimate the value of such an alarming-looking spectacle; and can accurately determine whether it was owing to any peculiar defects in the hive, or simply to some one or other of those ills to which bees are heir. Mr. Grant, the author of some very interesting papers on bees in the _Gardner's Chronicle_, witnessed their operations in a case of this kind. " In a quarter of an hour from their taking possession, they were observed busily employing bringing out the dead bees, small fragments of honey-comb, dead insects, and other dirt; and by the middle of the following day a little conical heap of their cleansings was to be seen on the ground in front of the hive; before night well loaded labourers were seen entering to repair the dilapidations, and refurnish the empty cells."
In the delicate and rather hazardous operation of securing a swarm, it will add considerably to the ease and carefulness of the operator if he is well defended from the bees. There are some persons who may do anything with bees, such as the celebrated Wildman, who was accustomed to amuse himself by making a swarm of bees settle on his chin like a heard, or hang from his hand, together with many other feats of the like nature, but there are many whom the bees detect, and who on that account cannot venture to meddle with a live. Even the illness of a formerly loved master has been known to destroy the allegiance of his bees, who would not suffer him to handle them until he had perfectly recovered. A bee-dress is therefore requisite. This consists principally of a large piece of gauze or net, tied round a wide-brimmed hat, and fastened securely round the shoulders. The hands should be defended with woollen gloves, whose thickness prevents the sting from reaching the skin, while the bee can easily withdraw its weapon after the attack. The gloves should be drawn over the buttoned cuffs of the coat. Thus defended the bee-owner may laugh at the attacks of a thousand bees. The hands and face may as a further precaution be rubbed with sweet herbs. It is necessary that the brim of the hat be very wide, as otherwise the veil sits closely upon the tip of the nose and the point of the chin, neither of which, particularly the former, are agreeable places to be disfigured with the sting of a bee. If at any time a bee succeeds in fixing its sting, there is no better cure than a little ammonia or hartshorn rubbed on the place. N\(\sim\) bee-keeper should be without a small bottle of hartshorn, which must be always kept carefully stopped.
The swarm once resettled in their new habitation, their labours begin with the construction of the comb in the mode we have already described in the preceding pages.
leave the hive with another colony, and relinquish the rights of sovereignty over the parent community in favour of one of her helpless sisters. And so, at last, she departs, and a second colony is speedily in course of establishment. Possibly a third, and yet a fourth, and a fifth, may follow ; the number of swarms being determined, no doubt, in ordinary circumstances, by the number of the bees, and the heat of the hive. But when the last swarm has departed, and the number of the inhabitants so lessened that the guards of the royal cells can no longer preserve their efficiency, the remaining young(queens emerge as they please, two or three at a time, and civil war, alas! does at last take place. But what an admirable mode of making civil war it is. It is the monarchs who fight, and who are but few in number, and must, therefore, soon bring the contest to an end; it is the bee-people that look on, quite content to pay allegiance to the conqueror. Of course no bee-subject can thus be in danger, by espousing the wrong("side, of losing his property, or his rank, or have his temper exasperated by defeat and humiliation; the contest affects none of these things. Let us, too, watch the contest. Two young aspirants for the throne are meeting; they rush at each other; each seizes with her teeth the antennae of her rival; they cling in mortal combat so close together that head, belly, and breast are mutually opposed. But nature has made them aware of their value, or possible value, supposing there were no other incipient sovereigns in the hive; and of the danger of instant death to both, should they in that position launch at each other the fatal dart. So they separate by a tacit mutual consent, and would apparently leave the combat to be determined at some other time. But that will not do for the bees. They can stand no shilly-shallying in the matter. They must and will know who is to be their ruler. Is government to stand still because the would-be governors are cowards? Certainly not. So the rivals are again driven together into the area, no matter how often the queens seek to evade the mortal issue, until at last the stronger one. seizes the other by the wing, curls her extremities under the body, and inflicts the death-pang.
The constitution of the queen-bee appears to be much stronger than that of the ordinary bees. When a drone be is pierced with a sting, he dies almost immediately, but the queen, although she is completely disabled, does not actually die for several hours, but remains crawling about the hive in a state of utter debility, while the victorious queen, knowing that her late opponent is incapable of doing any mischief, quietly lets her crawl about as much as she likes, and disdains to attack her a second time. She is now unquestioned mistress of the live. Love succeeds to war. The Amazon of the hour changes for an equally brief period, to the tender virgin, whom many aspire to woo and win. High in the air, where no eyes may follow, the drones prepare her nuptial couch. Before she ascends, she looks carefully around her, perhaps to assure herself against trying eyes, perhaps to know her own kingdom again, of which she has yet had so little experience. A few oxy half-diglits now take place, as though her mind misgave her, and, at last, she rises, describing in her flight large horizontal circles, until she is beyond the ken of human eyes. She returns in about half an hour, and so ends her brief time of love. Henceforward she is the queen and the mother (literally) of her people, and exhibits accordingly, ever afterwards, the gravity and decorum suitable to her exalted position.
Although the queen-bee is really the mother of the live, this privilege of hers is now and then usurped by a subject. It does sometimes happen that the worker-bees become fertile and lay eggs as well as the queen. This curious fact serves to prove the assertion that worker-bees are but undeveloped females. The fertile worker, however, deposits only eggs which become drones. The fact of their fertility is accounted for by supposing that some of the food intended for the royal nursing, and which is more pungent and stimulating than the food of the ordinary bees, has by the clumsiness of the nurse-bees been dropped into their cells while they were in their larva state. This conjecture is rendered more probable by the fact that those fertile workers invariably issue from cells near those fortunate bees who have been transformed into queen-bees by the ordinary process. When it so happens that the lawful sovereign of the hive has not been impregnated within twenty days after her emerging from her cell, the eggs which she lays will produce nothing but drones. The eggs producing dronesare in all cases laid late, but it does appear a very singular fact that a delay of so short a period should metamorphose the whole of the contents of the ovaries into male eggs. Huber conceived that the drones appeared thus late on account of the young queens.
**A** sad business remains behind. The post of queen's favourite has always been an honour of dubious value, often of tragic ending, even among mankind; with bees it is inevitably a fatal destiny. No sooner is the business of swarming ended, and the worker-bees satisfied there will be no lack of fertile queens, than issues the terrible edict for the massacre of the drones. Poor fellows! It is to be hoped they comfort themselves with the reflection that their fate is an everlasting homily, presented by nature in dogmatical but most effective fashion, of the uselessness of all who labour not for their living. If one must die for the good of one's kind, by all means let it be as a martyr. Poor fellows! how they dart in and out, and up and down the hive, in the vain hope of escape. The workers are inexorable. Huber tells us the latter plant their stings so deeply--for the most part between the segments of the abdomen--that they cannot extricate themselves without turning as upon a pivot. The cruelty apparent in the fiereness of the attack is perhaps only kindness, for the wound is _immediately_ fatal: the drones expand their wings, and die. All the drones, however, are not stung to death. Some are merely disabled by the workers, who bite and injure the roots of their wings so as to prevent them from taking to flight, while others appear to be merely expelled from the community and escape unlurt, although they are too wise to attempt to return; at all events, whether stung, maimed, or expelled, they all perish, and probably the fate of those who perish within the hive is to be preferred to that of the unfortunate bees who suffer a lingering death from cold or hunger, as they can find no warm live to shelter them, and do not know how to seek honey from flowers, as they have always fed from the stores at home. The unfortunate drones do not resign themselves to their fate as meekly as might be expected, but offer a most vigorous resistance to their murderers. Their struggle-are of course vain, for they are overpowered by numbers, and their jaws and wings, however powerful, can not, properly
duct the poison is conducted into the canal of the sting. As Paley has justly observed, "the machinery would have been ineffective without the ranking poison; the poison could not have been used unless some opening were made for it: a striking example, indeed, of the union of chemistry and mechanism." The pain of the bee's sting may be considerably lessened by a few very simple precautions. If the pigmy but formidable assailant be permitted quietly to withdraw its sting, the smart will be much relieved, and will wholly disappear if a little hartshorn be applied to the wound. If, however, the bee has inserted its sting and left it behind, in a part that can be moved about, as in the hand, if it is so held that the poison-bag of the sting hangs downwards, very little poison will enter the wound. I was once attacked by a bee which settled on my thumb, and then flew off, leaving its sting inserted in the skin. I was not aware that the bee had used its sting at all, until convinced by actual inspection. The base of the sting was then hanging downwards and caused no pain, but when in the course of inspection the point of the sting became lower than its base, the smart very soon showed that the poison had begun to pour into the wound. Upon again inverting it, and immediately taking out the sting, very little inconvenience was felt. After extracting a sting it is useful to press the barrel of a key firmly round the part. This precaution will prevent the poison from spreading, and also bring it more surely in contact with the hartshorn which has been placed upon it, or will guard it until the hartshorn can be applied. In the absence of hartshorn, any alkaline substance will alleviate the smart, as the poison is of an acid nature, and is neutralized by the alkali. Common soda will answer tolerably well, but hartshorn is the best remedy, and a supply should always be carried about the person in a small bottle, when any operations against bees, wraps, or hornets, are in progress, as even the armour of a bee-dress does sometimes suffer damages which permit the entrance of an infuriated bee, who will be certain to employ its sting in a most uncomfortuble manner. Soap has been tried with some success, and the leaf of the common dock, which is so useful as a remedy against the stings of the vegetable wasp, the nettle, is no ineffectual remedy.