_Anterior Leg of Worker, magnified._] [Illustration: Fig. 25. _Worker's Sting, magnified._ _a_--Tube. _b b_--Barbed spears drawn out of tube and turned back, _c_--Poison sack. _d_--Muscles. ] The workers, too, possess an organ of defense (Fig. 25), which they are quick to use if occasion requires. This is not curved as in the queen, but straight. The gland which secretes the poison is double, and the sack (Fig. 25, _c_), in which it is stored, is as large as a flax-seed. The sting proper, is a triple organ, consisting of three sharp spears, very smooth and of exquisite polish. The most highly-wrought steel instruments, under a high magnifier, look rough and unfinished, while the parts of the sting show no such inequalities. One of these spears (Fig. 25, _a_) is canaliculate--that is, it forms an imperfect tube--and in this canal work the other two (Fig. 25, _b, b_), which fill the vacant space, and thus the three make a complete tube, and through this tube, which connects with the poison sack, passes the poison. The slender spears which work in the tube are marvelously sharp, and project beyond it when used, and are worked alternately by small but powerful muscles (Fig. 25, _d_), so they may pass through buckskin, or even the thick scarf-skin of the hand. These are also barbed at the end with teeth, seven of which are prominent, which extend out and back like the barb of a fish-hook. Hence the sting cannot be withdrawn, if it penetrates any firm substance, and so when used, it is drawn from the bee, and carries with it a portion of the alimentary canal, thus costing the poor bee its life. Darwin suggests that bees and wasps were developed from the saw-flies, and that the barbs on the sting are the old-time saws, transformed into the spear-like barbs. He does not explain why these are so much shorter and more obscure in the queen, and in other bees and wasps. The honey-stomach or crop in the workers (Fig. 9, _o_) is well developed, though no larger than those in the drones. Whether it is more complex in structure, I do not know. The workers hatch from an impregnated egg, which can only come from a queen that has met a drone, and is always laid in the small, horizontal cell. These eggs are in no wise different, so far as we can see, from those which are laid in the drone or queen-cells. All are cylindrical and slightly curved (Fig. 26, _b, c_) and are fastened by one end to the bottom of the cell, and a little to one side of the centre. As already shown, these are voluntarily fertilized by the queen as she extrudes them, preparatory to fastening them in the cells. These eggs, though so small--one-sixteenth of an inch long--may be easily seen by holding the comb so that the light will shine into the cells. With experience, they are detected almost at once, but I have often found it quite difficult to make the novice see them, though very plainly visible to my experienced eye. [Illustration: Fig. 26. _Egg and Brood._