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The Life of the Bee The prosperity of the humble-bees never exceeds a certain limit, their laws are ill-defined and ill-obeyed, primitive cannibalism and infanticide reappear at intervals, the architecture is shapeless and entails much waste of material; but the cardinal difference between the two cities is that the one is permanent, and the other ephemeral. For, indeed, that of the humble-bee will perish in the autumn; its three or four hundred inhabitants will die, leaving no trace of their passage or their endeavours; and but a single female will survive, who, the next spring, in the same solitude and poverty as her mother before her, will recommence the same useless work. The idea, however, has now grown aware of its strength. Among the humble-bees it goes no further than we have stated, but, faithful to its habits and pursuing its usual routine, it will immediately undergo a sort of unwearying 400