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THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



happens. According to Eeaiuniir's 

 account, the queen during copula- 

 tion mounts the back of the drone, 

 and the latter parts thereupon with 

 the organs of procreation. One 

 may observe these organs and their 

 structure if he presses the drones 

 hard in the middle of the bod^'. 

 But the organ can no longer draw 

 back because there are two sac- 

 cules which, as it were, act like 

 elastic springs, project, and prevent 

 it from being drawn in. Therefore 

 every one of the males or drones 

 must die after copulation, and I 

 have often found such drones dead 

 in front of the hives, so to me the 

 fact is made apparent.- 



-The opinion that the drones copulate with 

 the queen and render her fruitful, although 

 not denied, is warmly contested by modern 

 naturalists; yet it may be that the drones are 

 the only males in the hive, and as well as pos- 

 sessing distinct generative organs, these also 

 contain a large portion of spermatozoa. 



Pastor Scliirach, among others, found out, 

 by minute and persevering investigation that 

 young queens, confined in small boxes 

 wherein were no drones, laid many fruitful 

 eggs. The queen must tlien become fruitful 

 without copulation. Moreover, tlie genital 

 organs of t!ie male do not appear to be pro- 

 portioned to those of the queen, which already 

 the great Svvammerdam believed, who sup- 

 posed the queen to be impregnated through 

 scent of the drones; but in regard to which 

 von Reaumur made the remark that it seemed 

 to him that tliis lack of proportion of the geni- 

 tals was not so great as appeared to Swanimer- 

 dam. We mistake when we would estimate the 

 magnitude of the genital organs of the male, as 

 they appear if we press them out of the body. 

 It can be shown in a moment how the organs 

 of the male and female are proportioned as 

 compared with each other, and I believe he is 

 right, after I accidentally saw the queen in the 

 act of laying her eggs outside the cells and 

 saw the opening of the womb. 



Thus we are slow to accept any newly dis- 

 covered truth in physiology until it is con- 

 firmed. The ways of the author of nature are 

 so marvellously diverse and the mystery of 

 procreation so deeply hidden, that must be 

 a very sound philosophy, very fully conceded 

 that admits of not the slightest doubt. 



But, b}^ reason of this diminu- 

 tion. Nature has provided a suffi- 

 cient number, which in a colony of 

 15,000 bees amount to 300, and in 

 one of 30,000 bees from 700 to 

 1000 drones so that there will not 

 be so great danger of the loss of 

 the queen on her marriage flight. 

 But that also, on the other hand, 

 there may not be too man}', and 

 the queen in her seraglio of hus- 

 bands go to ruin, the drone is by 

 nature very sluggish and cold- 

 blooded, and his amours must be 

 invited by the loving caresses of 

 the queen, and he continues to hold 

 her in liis embrace until he dies. 



This superabundance of drones is 



One generally finds concerning the produc- 

 tion of the insects many extraordinary things 

 in experience, which our certain knowledge 

 of the ordiuai-y ways of nature appears to 

 contradict. 



^Vhether now tlie queen is in herself a 

 fountain of fruitfulness, or whether and how 

 she is fecundated by the drones I'emains to us 

 yet a mystery. Yet it is not impossilde that 

 they can become fruitful without copulation, 

 because in nature we have entirely similar and 

 convincing examples. Here are insects, which 

 with and without copulation propagate, as the 

 snails, and chiefly the plant-lice, concerning 

 which Leuwenhoek, Cestoni, Bonnet and 

 others, have made experiments and found that 

 they have propagated to the tenth generation 

 witliout copulation. 



But the plant-lice, and indeed one and the 

 same species, without copulation bearyoung; 

 yet they also copulate and by means of the 

 copulation also propagate. So I believe that 

 these little animals, by a single copulation 

 can become fruitful through many genera- 

 tions, and s'o may it be also with the mother 

 bee. Indeed I believe almost surely that the 

 bee mother carries over the fruitfulness which 

 she has received through the male to her 

 daughter, granddaughter and great grand- 

 daughter, and so on, that also the queen larva 

 may become fruitful to ten, twenty genera- 

 tions, also fewer, and tlieir future deposit of 

 brood is fertilized without the help of the male. 



But if the queen without copulation at any 

 time should become fruitful, wherein exists 

 the unknown purpose of the drone? For what 

 has wise Nature provided so many drones with 



