SOCIAL LIl-'K <.) 



organized plans of this government. The eggs which 

 produce queens and workers are in nowise different. 

 They are spoken of as fertile eggs ; that is, they con- 

 tain within them the male element. The eggs which 

 are unfertilized bring forth drones. There is no evi- 

 dence, however, that drones cannot also be produced 

 from fertilized eggs. 



The eggs hatch in about three days after being laid. 

 The newly hatched larvse are fed by nurse bees with a 

 lactic fluid which is secreted in a portion of the alimen- 

 tary canal of the nurse bee. All are fed with this until 

 about three days old, when the bees intended to become 

 workers and drones are given a substance familiarly 

 known as bee-bread. Those larva 1 which are to make 

 queens are fed throughout their whole growing period 

 with this lactic fluid from the nurse hees ; a substance 

 which, on account of its being the sole nourishment of 

 the queen not only during her period of development but 

 likewise throughout her whole existence, is commonly 

 called " royal jelly." From this it will be seen that the 

 only difference between the queen and the worker is in 

 the quality of the food given to them in their growing 

 stages. 



The presence of a queen is necessary to the existence 

 of every colony, and should the queen be removed fmin 

 any cause the workers at once set about to develop an- 

 other queen by continuously feeding a newly hatched 

 larva with this royal jelly. The queen spends about 

 three days in the egg stage, six in the larval, and seven 

 in the quiescent or pupal stage, before appearing as an 

 adult. 



The queen cells are houses in which the queens are 



