Appropriately styled, by German bee-keepers, the mother-bee, is the only perfectly developed female among the whole population of each separate colony. Thus her majesty indisputably sways her sceptre by a divine right, because she lives and reigns in the hearts of loving children and subjects.
Dr. Evans[2] introduces the queen-bee to our notice thus:—
"First of the throng, and foremost of the whole.
One 'stands confest the sovereign and the soul.'"
[2] Dr. Evans—who may be styled the poet-laureate of the bees—lived at Shrewsbury, where he practised as a physician. His poem on bees is written with great taste and careful elaboration, and it describes the habits of bees with a degree of accuracy only attainable after continuous scientific observation.
The queen may very readily be distinguished from the rest of the bees by the greater length of her body and the comparative shortness of her wings; her legs are longer, and are not furnished with either brushes or baskets as those of the working bee, for, being constantly fed by the latter, she does not need those implements; the upper surface of her body is of a brighter black than the other bees, whilst her colour underneath is a yellowish brown;[3] her wings, which do not extend more than half the length of her body, are sinewy and strong; her long abdomen tapers nearly to a point; her head is rounder, her tongue more slender, and not nearly so long, as that of the working bee, and her sting is curved. Her movements are measured and majestic; as she moves in the hive the other bees form a circle round her, none venturing to turn their backs upon her, but all anxious to show that respect and attention due to her rank and station. Whenever, in the exercise of her sovereign will, the queen wishes to travel amongst her subjects, she experiences no inconvenience from overcrowding; although the part of the hive to which she is journeying may be the most populous, way is immediately made, the common bees tumbling over each other to get out of her path, so great is their anxiety not to interfere with the royal progress.
[3] Yellow Italian queens form an exception in point of colour. See frontispiece, fig. I.
It is the chief function of the queen to lay the eggs from which all future bees originate, the multiplication of the species being the purpose of her existence; and she follows it up with an assiduity similar to that with which the workers construct combs or collect honey. A queen is estimated to lay in the breeding season from 1,500 to 2,000 eggs a-day, and in the course of one year is supposed to produce more than 100,000 bees. This is indeed a vast number; but when there is taken into consideration the great number required for swarms, the constant lessening of their strength by death in various ways, and the many casualties attending them in their distant travels in search of the luscious store, it does not seem that the case is over-stated.
In a Glass Unicomb Hive,—which we shall hereinafter describe,—all the movements of the queen-bee may be traced; she may be seen thrusting her head into a cell to discover whether it be occupied with an egg or honey, and if empty, she turns round in a dignified manner and inserts her long body—so long, that she is able to deposit the egg at the bottom of the cell; she then passes on to another, and so continues industriously multiplying her laborious subjects. It not unfrequently happens when the queen is prolific, and if it be an early season, that many eggs are wasted for want of unoccupied cells; for in that case the queen leaves them exposed at the bottom of the hive, when they are greedily devoured by the bees.
The queen-bee, unlike the great majority of her subjects, is a stayer at home; generally speaking, she only quits the hive twice in her life. . The first occasion is on the all-important day of her marriage, which always takes place at a great height in the air, and generally on the second or third day of her princess-life; she never afterwards leaves the hive, except to lead off an emigrating swarm. Evans, with proper loyalty, has duly furnished a glowing epithalamium for the queen-bee thus:—