though they do not burthen themselves with the task of collecting provisions, they bear their part in secreting wax. Like the hive-drones, they have no sting; but they are exempted from the severe fate of the former, in escaping the cruel, massacre to which those are doomed. They are suffered to live, and enjoy the natural term of their existence, which, however, extends not beyond the end of Autumn. On the first approach of cold weather, they exhibit evident symptoms of decreasing activity. On alighting on the flowers of any of the late blossoming plants,—as the sun-flower, thistle, &c.; the intoxicating juices concur with the diminished temperature in rendering them utterly helpless, and incapable of saving themselves from danger, and their languor increases till the severity of the cold benumbs them altogether, and life becomes extinct. The workers are not all neuters. Many of them bred in spring, copulate with the males in June, and lay eggs soon after, but only those of males. These males fecundate those females which are reared towards the end of the season, but which do not begin to lay till the following spring, when they each lay the foundation of a new colony. At the approach of winter, that is, the first winter of their existence, they, the females viz. to the number of 30 or 40 together, make a lodgement in or near the old nest, where they pass the torpid season in safety and quiet, till the return of spring awakes them to life and activity, and natural instinct prompts them to disperse, and seek each a dwelling of her own. The old mother, the
