560 New Works on Bees. 



guished entomologists and eminent apiarians, and has embo- 

 died in his work much valuable matter which has appeared 

 since the publication of the former edition. 



In treating of the various individuals of which a hive is 

 composed, we could have wished to see a further investiga- 

 tion into the nature of those individuals which are called cap- 

 tains and black bees. In like manner it would be very in- 

 teresting to ascertain the peculiarities attendant upon the 

 relative developement of the two kinds of workers, namely, 

 the nursery bees and the wax workers. Every bee keeper is 

 aware of the difference of these latter individuals, first pointed 

 out by Huber, and very recently confirmed, as regards the 

 humble bees, by Mr. Newport. In speaking of the develope- 

 ment of the queen bee, Dr. Bevan says, — " the most incom- 

 prehensible part of the process is that increasing the size and 

 changing the direction of the cells, and feeding the larva with 

 a more pungent food, should not only allow the sexual organs 

 of the insect to be fully developed, but should alter the shape 

 of her tongue, her jaws, and her sting, deprive her of the pow- 

 er of secreting wax, and obliterate the baskets which, but for 

 the changes just referred to, would have been formed upon 

 her thighs." Now it appears to us that this is not the "most 

 incomprehensible part of the process;" the queen bee is nor- 

 mally a perfectly developed female ; — the various queens pro- 

 duced in a hive are also normally perfect. The neuters, on 

 the other hand, are normally imperfect ; it is essential for the 

 well being of the hive, that their sexual instincts should be 

 obliterated ; the hive could not exist were not this the case. 

 Now we affirm that the most incomprehensible part of the 

 process is, that in a community consisting of 52,001 indivi- 

 duals, (viz., 1 queen, 2,000 drones, and 50,000 workers), the 

 surprising number of 50,000 of the inhabitants are reared up 

 in a state of imperfection. Fed with a different kind of food, 

 their structure is modified and their instincts completely al- 

 tered. Now the knowledge we possess of the power which 

 the bees enjoy of effecting this alteration, leads us to conjec- 

 ture that they also possess a power of still further modifying 

 the nature of the neuter bees themselves, so as to produce the 

 different kinds of neuters mentioned above. We throw out 

 this hint to the philosophical observer of the economy of the 

 hive. 



In the anatomical part of the work we find the descriptions 

 of the various parts of the mouth much simplified ; but the 

 paragraphs in p. 297 appear to have been disarranged, for 

 after describing the lower lip and maxillae, which, when in 



