[692] Huber, 83.
[693] Ibid. 93.
[695] Huber, 110.
[696] Huber, 109.—Gould had, long before Huber, observed that female ants cast their wings, pp. 59, 62, 64. I have frequently observed them, sometimes with only one wing, at others with only fragments of the wings; and again, at others they were so completely pulled off, that it could not be known that they formerly had them, only by the sockets in which they were inserted.
[697] Huber, 93.
[698] See Willughby in Rai. Hist. Ins. 251. and Reaum.
[699] Reaum. vi. 174.
[700] It is not unlikely that it may undergo some other alteration in the bee's stomach, which may possibly secrete some peculiar substance, as John Hunter discovered that the crop of the pigeon does.
[701] Dr. Johnson was ignorant of the etymology of this word. It is clearly derived from the German Hummel or Hummel Biene, a name probably given it from its sound. Our English name would be more significant were it altered to Humming-bee or Booming-bee.