JUST as the head of an animal is the most important part of its body, so too is it in the case of an insect.
A bee’s head, as seen with the aid of a microscope, looks very peculiar, but nevertheless it is exceedingly interesting. A photograph of it is shown (b) on Plate VI. The head is something like a split pea in shape, with the rounded part turned to the front; it is joined to the thorax by a thin neck.
The bee has five eyes, two compound and three simple. The compound eyes are placed one on each side of the head, like the eyes of the house-fly, and the simple eyes are to be found on the top of the head. In Plate VII. the position of the eyes is shown, but only one of the simple eyes is to be seen. In addition to the eyes, the head carries the antennæ, which are two in number, and the whole of the head is covered with a multitude of tiny hairs of a light golden colour.
The bee has, of course, a brain in the proper sense of the word; it is, however, very minute, though all the more wonderful for being so. The nervous system consists of a number of “nerve centres,” which are situated in the body. The chief nerve centre, or ganglion as it is called, is in the head, and from this point multitudes of nerves run to all parts of the body. The word ganglion comes from the Greek, and means a knot, and it is really a knot of nerves. The nerves resemble underground telegraph wires, which perhaps you have seen; and like them, they run in bundles, which in turn are enclosed in a pipe or sheath. Each telegraph wire sends a message to some part of the country, and the nerves of the bee, in like manner, transmit messages to different parts of its body. Other ganglia are situated in the thorax and in the abdomen, but the largest one is, as I have said, in the head. You will easily understand from this, that the ganglia are almost like little brains, distributed in the body of the bee. Now here is a most remarkable fact, but perfectly simple when you understand what I have just told you. Sometimes a bee may have a fight with another bee, and perhaps she will be unfortunate enough to have her head cut off. You might imagine that this would be at once fatal to the bee, but it is not so. She is still able to walk about the hive in quite an important fashion! Of course she cannot see, nor can she feel her way about with her antennæ, and she is therefore of no use. Soon she will die, but the fact remains that a bee can live for a time even when its head is cut off. In the same way, if a bee is feeding on honey and her abdomen is cut off at the waist, she will still go on sucking up the honey, in blissful ignorance of the fact that her body has been cut in half! Then if the abdomen is picked up and placed in the palm of the hand, it will probably start twisting round, in the attempt to bury its sting in the flesh!