Page:The life of the bee (IA cu31924101469827).pdf/121

The Swarm tragic and distant quest of love. This they will never do, however, if they be provided with a fragment of comb containing brood-cells, whence they shall be able to rear other queens. Indeed, their affection even may turn into fury and hatred should their sovereign fail in her duty to that sort of abstract divinity that we should call future society, which the bees would appear to regard far more seriously than we. It happens, for instance, at times, that apiarists for various reasons will prevent the queen from joining a swarm by inserting a trellis into the hive; the nimble and slender workers will flit through it, unperceiving, but to the poor slave of love, heavier and more corpulent than her daughters, it offers an impassable barrier. The bees, when they find that the queen has not followed, will return to the hive, and scold the unfortunate prisoner, hustle and ill-treat her, 109