FERTILIZATION IN THE HONEY-BEE Das 
covers the vesicle; this is continuous with the envelope of the 
gland on one side and of the testis on the other. Sperms, 
passing into the vesicle, tend to arrange themselves radially in 
its lumen, their heads attached to the wall, their free filaments 
toward the center (pl. 2, figs. 5, 5b). The testes, which mature 
their sperm some days before the emergence of the drone, and 
at this time occupy most of the abdominal cavity, rapidly de- 
generate thereafter; in old drones they are noticeable only as 
small greenish-yellow remnants applied dorsally to the accessory 
glands. 
PRESENT INVESTIGATION 
Attempts to obtain motile sperms from drones, by dissection 
or otherwise, demonstrate that they are not available in all 
drones. This fact has been variously interpreted. McLain? 
inferred that there were three classes of drones. One class 
yielded no spermatic fluid when extrusion of the penis was brought 
about by compressing the abdomen. A second class yielded only 
mucus from the accessory gland. A third yielded a seminal 
fluid containing sperm. Shafer,’ in discussing McLain’s work, 
agrees with him that the food which drones receive at mating 
time is important as a stimulant to the copulatory impulse. 
The writer sought to correlate the observed facts of McLain 
with the known fact that young drones (younger than an age 
variously stated to be from ten to twenty-one days) will not 
mate with queens. Drones of different ages were selected for 
study, ranging from pupae whose eyes were just becoming 
pigmented to mature insects three weeks after emergence. These 
stages are designated in the present paper by the letters A to H 
(table, p. 252). 
The fact became immediately apparent that a definite and 
complicated histological development and growth of the organs, 
rather than a special food stimulant, was involved in the differ- 
ence of functioning observed. This development takes place 
®McLain. Description of experiments on artificial insemination of queen 
bees, in report of the entomologist, on Experiments in Apiculture, U. S. Com- 
missioner of Agriculture’s Report for 1885. 
