Page:Jardine Naturalist's library Bees.djvu/147

Rh may convince us, that bees, like human beings, are often the slaves of circumstances, and that their instinct is sometimes at fault. Second Swarms.—After the departure of the first swarm with the old Queen at its head, the community is, for a time, without a reigning Queen. There is brood in the royal cells, but none come to maturity; and it is not till the fifth, sixth, or seventh day in ordinary cases, that the senior of the young princesses is hatched, and takes her place as Queen regnant. Her first step is to hasten to the other royal cells, and endeavour to destroy her rivals. In these attempts, with which she is incessantly occupied for several days, she is strongly opposed by the workers, to whom, so long as she remains a virgin, she is an object of indifference; and the scene takes place which has been described in page 95. At every repulse by the workers, she utters the shrill monotonous sound which is called piping, and which is heard for two or three days previous to the departure of a second swarm; while the younger Queens in confinement respond, sometimes two or three of them at the same moment, in a voice sounding hoarse from the recesses of their prison. Irritated by such opposition, and annoyed at the sight of so many royal cells in every quarter, the young Queen becomes extremely agitated, and at last rushes, together with the bees to whom she has imparted her agitation, through the outlets of the hive, and thus forms the second swarm. Circumstances sometimes occur to prevent the departure of a second swarm. If the young Queen, as