320 PROCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES. 



Feet and Progression against Gravity. — The smaller specimens 

 of these ticks may be often seen crawling, like flies and some 

 other insects, up and under the sides of polished surfaces. This 

 is done by means of the caruncles, one of which is situated 

 between each of the pair of hooked and terminal claws, on their 

 concave side. When the creature has the claws free, each 

 caruncle presents a crescentic shape, but the moment it is applied 

 to the glass or other smooth surface the caruncles become adapted 

 to it, and assume the form of round flattened disks. All this 

 may be well seen with the half-inch objective, when the Ixodes is 

 walking on the glass object-slide, by an examination of the 

 action on both sides, i. e. either from the ventral or dorsal 

 aspect of the animal. As no mark of viscid matter is then 

 perceptible, it is probable that atmospheric pressure produces the 

 efi:ect. Argas is devoid of such pedal structure. 



Queen-bee Jelly. — The eminent apiarian Major Munn, having 

 sent specimens of queen-bee cells, with their contained larvse and 

 jelly (or "bee bread"), from four to eight days old, Mr. Gulliver 

 undertook to examine it. The colour of the jelly was whitish, its 

 consistence pulpy, its taste somewhat sharp and sweetish. It 

 reddened litmus ; was miscible with water, and assumed an opaque 

 white colour with alcohol, sublimate, nitric acid, and heat. Acetic 

 acid produced no efl'ect, but caustic potass very quickly and com- 

 pletely dissolved it, and the solution was instantly precipitated on 

 the addition of acetic acid. There was no trace of gelatine in the 

 jelly ; it soon dried into an amber-like solid, but became white and 

 pulpy, as it was originally, when soaked in water. Morpholo- 

 gically, the jelly was partly composed of a very fine molecular base, 

 like that of mammalian chyle, the molecules much alike in size and 

 form, and measuring each about l-30,000th of an inch in diameter ; 

 but the molecules, being completely insoluble in alcohol or ether, 

 difler from those of chyle. 



It is not a little remarkable that this queen-bee jelly, though 

 undoubtedly of very high importance in the economy of this most 

 useful insect, is not even mentioned, much less described, in the 

 great books of animal, organic, or physiological chemistry. 

 When noticed in other works, it is but perfunctorily, and in 

 a manner to indicate a collection from pollen or other parts 

 of plants ; and it was seen by Mr. Grulliver to contain a few 

 pollen-grains, some almost perfect, others disintegrated, but alto- 

 gether insufficient to form the essential composition. 



But, now, this is plainly proved to be one of the albuminoid 

 group, affording an abundance of Mulder's protein, highly nitro- 

 genized, and with a molecular base, the whole evidently a true 

 animal secretion and by no means a mere collection. Aud thus 

 the queen-bee jelly is exactly such a nutrient matter as may be 

 rationally supposed most conducive to the growth and development 

 of the larva, just as milk is to young mammals, and the ingluvial 

 secretion of certain birds to their nestlins^fs. 



