Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 3.djvu/514

498 operation be performed before she is impregnated, she remains barren, since it is necessary for the sexual congress that she should fly out of the hive. The amputation of a single antenna appeared to be productive of no bad conse quence of any kind ; but the removal of both the antennae was followed by singular effects. ^ The queen which had suffered this operation ran about in apparent confusion, dropping her eggs at random, and was incapable of directing her tongue with precision to the food that was offered her. At times she appeared desirous of escaping from the hive ; and when this was prevented, she returned in a state of delirium, was indifferent to the caresses of the workers, and received another similarly mutilated queen that was pre sented to her without the least symptom of dislike. The workers, on the other hand, received the stranger queen with great respect, although the first still remained in the hive. A third queen, not mutilated, was next introduced; she was very ill received and immediately detained and kept a close prisoner, being evidently regarded as an intruder. When the queen deprived of her antennae was allowed to quit the hive, she was followed by none of the workers, and was abandoned to her fate.

The wasp and the hornet have long been known as the determined enemies of the bee, committing great ravages among these weaker insects ; they attack them individually, but oftener commit their aggressions in large armies, on which occasions numbers perish on both sides. In some parts of America wasps have multiplied to so great a degree as to render it impossible to rear bees. Among quadrupeds the ant-eater occasionally devours them. The bear and the badger overturn the hives, and plunder their contents. Rats and mice are very formidable enemies, as they attack the bees at all seasons, and especially during the torpid state of the insects, when they are incapable of revenging the aggression. The woodpecker may succeed in breaking through the hive, and then speedily destroys all its inhabitants; the swallow, the sparrow, the tit mouse, the cuckoo, the Herops apiaster, or bee-eater, and poultry of every kind, prey upon them separately. Accord ing to Bosc, they are also food for the shrikes and for the Falco apivorus. Lizards watch for them, and seize them as they alight near the hive. Toads occasionally devour them. They are in some danger from the larger kinds of spiders, and of Libellulce, as also from the Philanthus apivorus of Fabricius. But the most insidious and de structive enemies of these insects are moths, two species of which, Galleria mellonella and Achroia grisella, insinuate themselves into the hive, and deposit their eggs on the combs in such numbers, that the hive is soon overrun with the larvae, the combs destroyed, and the bees event ually forced to vacate the hive. In America arid in Italy these moths are much more troublesome than in England. On the Continent of Europe bees are also troubled with a parasite called the bee-louse (Braula coeca), some times as many as 50 or 100 being found on a single bee, and as they live by suction they are great pests. This insect is not frequently found in England except accompanying imported Ligurian bees.

Bees are subject to few diseases, but these few are some-times very fatal. Dysentery occasionally commits great havoc in a hive, and is usually caused by the neglect of sanitary-measures, by close confinement, want of ventilation, and damp. Dysentery is indicated by the appearance of the excrement within the hive, which the bees in a healthy state are particularly careful to exclude. It is often induced by the bees being forced into undue excitement in cold, ungenial weather. The disease known generally by the name of &quot;foul brood&quot; is the most fatal of all; it is highly contagious, the infection from its presence remaining in the hives, combs, and honey long after the bees are exterminated. Dysentery is a disease of the perfect insects only. Foul brood is confined to the larvae, which, having grown to near maturity, die and putrefy after being sealed over by the bees. The workers seem totally unable to remove the foul mass which thus remains to spread infection all around. The seed of the disease is believed to lie in the presence of the spores of a microscopical fungus (Micrococcus), and long scientific discussions and experiments have been made on the Con tinent to demonstrate this, particularly by Drs Preusz and Schonfeld. The devastation caused in apiaries by this disease is sometimes fearful. Dzierzon relates that, in 1848, he had nearly the whole of his colonies destroyed by it, more than 500 being destroyed, and only 10 escaping. Quinby also, in America, has lost as many as 100 stocks in a single year by this pestilence. And when once fully developed a total destruction of all hives and combs infected appears to be the only way of eradicating it. Honey from a foul brood hive will carry the germs of the disease to any bees which may consume it. The presence of this disease may be detected by the foul smell emanating from the hive, and from the circumstance of many cells remain ing covered longer than naturally occurs when there are living pupae within them.

In the management of bees a great deal must, of course, depend on supplying them with an abundant pasture. A rich corn country is well known to be to them as a barren desert during a great portion of the year. Hence the judicious practice of shifting them from place to place according to the circumstances of the season. It was the advice of Celsus that, after the vernal pastures were con sumed, bees should be transported to places abounding with autumnal flowers ; and in accordance with that advice they were in ancient times annually carried from Achaia to Attica, and from Euboea and the islands of the Cycladea to Seyms. In Sicily, also, they were brought to Hybla from other parts of the island. So also in Scotland, so soon as the &quot; bright consummate flowers &quot; of summer are on the wane, the people of the Lowlands despatch their hives in cart-loads to the blooming heather of the mountain pastures, where a never-ending paradise of sweets is spread before them. It is, indeed, to be regretted that our moor lands are not more utilized for this object than they are. The very air of the Highland hills is often redolent with rich perfume, giving earnest of a bountiful harvest ; only a solitary bee is seen here and there, labouring with wearied wing among the inexhaustible stores of nature, and scarcely able to regain with its burden its lonely shieling in the distant vale. Considering the poverty of the peasantry, and their frequent want of occupation, it is to be lamented that so easy and pleasant a source of emolument should be so much neglected by them. In consequence of this neglect a large sum is paid every year to foreign nations for articles that could be raised at home, in every respect superior, with very little outlay either of labour or of capital. We learn from Pliny that the practice of removing bees from place to place was frequent in the Roman territories. &quot; As soon,&quot; he says, &quot; as the spring food for bees has failed in the valleys near our towns, the hives of bees are put into boats, and carried up against the stream of the river in the night, in search of better pasture. The bees go out in the morning in quest of provisions, and return regularly to their, hives in the boats, with the stores they have collected. This method is continued till the sinking of the boats to a certain depth in the water shows that the hives are sufficiently full; and they are then carried back to their former homes, where their honey is taken out of them.&quot; And this is still the practice of the Italians who live near the banks of the Po, the river which Pliny instanced particularly in the passage above quoted.