THE EVOLUTION OF THE BEE AND THE BEEHIVE
into three or four parallel galleries, in which they place their broad cells. Between the cells they make partitions formed of fragments of wood cemented together by their saliva. These bees pass the winter in the adult stage, hibernating in the imago condition. Both sexes reappear in the spring, and some species may take two years to complete the cycle of their life history. They are very hairy, and some of the females closely resemble the bumble-bee. The cells are provisioned with pollen, and the bees apparently produce little or no honey.
If we now turn to the social bees we find three groups. One is known as the mosquito bee, from its very small size. These bees are also sometimes spoken of as stingless bees, though they have a rudimentary sting, which they do not use. Little is known about them, but they form communities consisting of a large number of individuals. We do not certainly know whether these bees are all the product of a single queen or whether there may be more than one egg-producer in each colony, but the evidence seems to show that every colony has its own queen. The nests are rich in honey, and to prevent them from being robbed the workers, who are usually occupied in collecting pollen, also collect clay, with which they build a wall to protect the nest, which is generally placed on a bank or in the trunk of a tree. Every nest is thus completely surrounded with clay. The honey is stored in separate cells or in clusters of cells, each cluster about the size of a pigeon’s egg, and these are placed at the bottom of the hive, away from the cells where the larvae are growing. The comb made by some species resembles a spiral staircase, and there are special cells for the pollen as well as for the honey; and here, for the first time, we find wax used to form the comb. Here also we find the three separate castes, the queen or queens, producing eggs; the working bees, or bar-
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