PAIRING OF BEES^ 25^ 



February and March, which fail not to be productive; 

 and this is not explicable by the preceding- theory. 

 The elder Huber repeated the observations of Debraw, 

 and was disposed at first to think them correct; but 

 more minute investigation convinced him that what 

 Debraw had taken for a fluid was nothing more than 

 a peculiar reflection of light from the bottom of the 

 cells, no vestiges of a fluid being perceptible when the 

 cells were detached and cut asunder. But Huber did 

 not rest contented with this ; for, taking advantage of 

 the fact that bees can remain under water a consider- 

 able time without much injury, he had several swarms 

 immersed for the purpose of examining whether any 

 males were present. In his first experiment of this 

 kind, having ascertained that there were no males 

 present, not even in embryo, as soon as the bees were 

 dry, he replaced them, with their queen, in the hive, 

 taking the precaution to barricade the entrance so as 

 to prevent the intrusion of any males from without. 

 This was done the 6th of August, and the same day 

 the queen deposited fourteen eggs in workers' cells, 

 which were all duly hatched four days afterwards. 

 This experiment appeared to be decisive ; but lest it 

 might be alleged that the workers, when deprived 

 of males, might search for the fecundating matter in 

 other hives, and bring home what was wanted, Huber 

 tried another experiment, rigidly confining all the bees, 

 which had as before undergone immersion, from the 

 10th till the 14th of August; yet in this case he found 

 forty young larva? just hatched. He even immersed 

 this hive a second time, examining every individual 

 bee by hand, with a similar result. He therefore 

 came to the conckision that Debraw had employed 

 in his experiments queens, with whose previous his- 

 tory he was not acquainted *. 



Swammerdam, again, was inclined to adopt the still 

 * Huber on Bees, p, 14, 



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