242 ALTERNATE GENERATION AND 



caimot be developed into a new individual, (animal or plant,) unless it 

 lias been i^reviouslj" fructified by tlie action of the male seed," it seemed 

 expedient to confine the term "jjarthenogenesis" to the new phenomena. 

 In this sense it was first used by the ingenious founder of this imi^ortant 

 new theory, the distinguished zoologist of the Munich University, 

 Karl Theodor v. Siebold, in his paper on "True Parthenogenesis in But- 

 terflies and Bees; an Essay on the Eeproduction of Animals. Leipsic, 

 1856." 



Parthenogenesis or virginal generation, according to Siebold, com- 

 prises " those phenomena which demonstrate that true ova may be de- 

 veloped into new individuals without the fecundating intervention of 

 the male seed." 



There is no want of observations of former times according to which 

 the eggs of virgin insects were said to have produced new individuals, 

 but they were considered erroneous. Zoologists doubted that they were 

 made with proper care, and attempted to explain them in different forced 

 ways, finally classing them under metagenesis. Among them are the 

 communications of De Geer on the psychides, and of Herold on the silk- 

 worms. In 184^5 the celebrated apiculturist, K. Dzierzon, a Catholic 

 priest at Karlsmarkt, east of Brieg, in Prussian Silesia, emjihatically 

 maintained in the "Bienenzeitung," p. 113, that the eggs from which 

 the male bees or drones originate are produced and developed by the 

 sole inherent power of the mother bee without the action of male seed. 

 This view at first seemed simply incredible to apiarists; they supposed 

 that he had either deceived himself or intended to mystify others. But 

 when Dzierzon reiterated his statement he was severely attacked, and 

 the dispute continued for a long time. 



Until 1852 Dzierzon stood alone against their attacks, but undaunted, 

 unconquered. He could fall back on the experience of many years. 

 Every oue knows that there are queens which produce only male pro- 

 geny or drones, and never lay an egg from which mature females, 

 queens, or stinted females, workers are developed ; that there are others 

 which may lay female eggs for a time but afterward become like the 

 former, and that finally there are worker-bees which lay eggs, which 

 give birth only to male individuals. 



Among the first-class Dzierzon frequently found bees whose wings 

 were lame. They were thus prev^ented from making their hymenial 

 flight from which they would otherwise have returned impregnated. 

 Other queens which laid male eggs from the beginning were hatched 

 either very early or very late in the year, at a time when there were 

 either no more or only very few drones left, so that their flight was in 

 vain. Queens which at first laid normal eggs and afterward produced 

 only drones were older individuals, whose stock of seed had become grad- 

 ually exhausted. Worker-bees, which sometimes lay eggs and never 

 have any other male progeny, have never been aiul are indeed incapa- 

 ble of being impregnated. From these facts Dzierzon concluded that 



