556 Mr. John Lowe’s Observations on 
which is lame in the wings does not seek to take a 
“wedding flight.” Iam inclined to believe the former, 
but not the latter statement. A maimed or defective 
bee, worker or queen, will not be deterred, by reason of 
such defects, from going abroad. I have had more than 
one instance where sucha defective queen came out only 
to fall over the board and perish. I witnessed a queen on 
two successive days come thus out to go through the 
same course ; on the first occasion I picked her up, and 
restored her to the hive, but the following day she 
repeated the attempt, and I failed to induce her again 
to enter. I have little faith, therefore, im Von Berlepsch’s 
statements as to lame-winged queens, unless, indeed, 
they are reared during the cold spring, or at the end 
of autumn, when they are prevented from going abroad 
by the state of the weather. 
Swammerdam, Réaumur, Debraw, and Hattorf, had all 
different theories regarding fecundation. Huber, with 
Réaumur, believed that the queen’s fecundation followed 
actual union, and that no ova were deposited till this was 
accomplished. They differed only as to whether a union 
could take place in the interior of the hive. The former 
believed it could only occur in the air. 
I do not see that we have any evidence that the coitus 
takes place “ high in the air,” as many suppose ; indeed, 
judging from analogy, from the Bombus and wasp, we 
might infer the contrary. But the fact is, we have 
no well authenticated evidence in the matter. The 
queen, it is true, rises aloft on her setting out, just as 
any young bee or drone does, but I doubt if she con- 
tinues to fly far at such an altitude. Like Huber, I 
never have been so fortunate as to witness the act of 
coition, though I once surprised a couple of wasps in 
flagranti, and had the opportunity of showing them to 
the venerable Sir William Jardine, who confessed to me 
he had never seen it before. I have always felt surprised 
at the lack of ocular proof on this head, in the case of the 
bee, and can only account for it by the supposition that 
the coitus must be of very short duration. 
The fact of certam queens and workers also being 
drone-breeders was known long ago to apiarians. Hat- 
torf believed that in such cases the queen is_ self- 
fecundated. Huber ascribed the fact of the queen pro- 
ducing only drones to retarded impregnation, that is, to 
impregnation beyond the twentieth day of herage. I 
