+9 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ferred until the twenty-first day of her life, she not only lays nothing 

 but drone-eggs, but her instincts are also impaired. Perfect, fertile 

 queens always discriminate when laying ; they deposit the drone and 

 worker-eggs in their own peculiar cells, but the queens whose impreg- 

 nation is retarded are indifferent, and lay their eggs anywhere. Pre- 

 vious to Huber's time, it was believed that the worker-bees, like 

 worker-ants, carry away eggs thus misplaced, and deposit them in the 

 proper cells ; but he ascertained the fact that they carry away such 

 eggs only to devour them. By some unknown means the bees can 

 distinguish a worker from a drone egg; and, if, by an oversight, a 

 worker-egg is allowed to develop into a larva in a drone-cell, or vice 

 versa, the bees cap over the cell with the fiat or convex cover peculiar 

 to its inmate, without reference to the size of the cell upon which they 

 are working. 



Reaumur, and most other naturalists, had believed that the queens 

 deposit, in royal cells, a peculiar egg, which develops into a queen ; 

 but Schirach, a German clergyman, announced, toward the close of 

 the last century, a discovery which created not a little interest. Some 

 doubt still hung over this discovery, which was entirely dispelled by 

 Huber's observations. Schirach stated that the bees can, by peculiar 

 treatment, rear a queen from a worker-brood. 



If a swarm of bees find itself suddenly queenless, the workers im- 

 mediately select the larva of a common bee, not over three days old ; 

 they enlarge this cell by cutting down the partition-walls between it 

 and two adjoining cells, destroying their inmates, and then they sup- 

 ply the remaining worm w T ith food, differing in quality and quantity 

 from that of the workers. The nursery of the royal heir is elongated, 

 and finally capped over with a peculiar covering. In sixteen days 

 after its exclusion from the egg this larva becomes a queen. From 

 increase of space, accession of heat, and the different quality and quan- 

 tity of food given to the worm, that which would have become a 

 worker becomes a queen. By this change of treatment, its anatomy 

 and physiology, its instincts and functions, the time necessary for its 

 development, and the length of its life, are all utterly changed. The 

 queen performs but one office in the hive, that of supplying her realm 

 with subjects, while the workers perform all the multitudinous offices 

 which the economy of the hive demands. The whole structure of the 

 queen and workers is coordinated to their functions ; she possesses 

 the ovaries, which in the worker lie folded away in a germinal form, 

 while they possess all the organs needed for their peculiar work 

 strong mandibles, powerful wings, pollen-basket, pincers, brush, wax- 

 pockets, and honey-receptacle. Though queens are often made from 

 worker-larvrc, Huber observed the old queen laying in royal cells, 

 when the hive is about to throw off new swarms, and more than one 

 queen will be required. 



He also determined that some few workers, which have partaken 



