THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



225 



a little time, that is until she comes 

 forth from the cell again. 



She lays the eggs regularly in 

 those cells which she selects ; and 

 does she also know, before she lays 

 the egg, what kind of an egg it 

 will be, whether worker or drone? 

 which is an extraordinary thing in 

 nature because, for example, a hen 

 may not know whether, out of the 

 egg she la^^s will come a cock or 

 hen. I have seen the queen al- 

 ready a thousand times lay eggs in 

 the cells and still never could ob- 

 serve that the worker-bees removed 

 the eggs and placed them in other 

 cells. Indeed, I have seen that 

 the bee-mother laid two or three 

 eggs in one cell and also that for 

 want of empty cells she has let fall 

 several eggs outside on the combs, 

 and which her attendants catch up 

 wuth the mouth and seem to eat, 

 but probably bring them to a suita- 

 ble place and preserve them ; and 

 I have never yet seen that they had 

 carried a worker egg from a worker 

 cell into a drone cell or a little egg 

 out of a drone into a worker cell. 



If the queen does not find a suffi- 

 cient number of prepared cells for 

 all eggs which are ready to be laid, 

 and of which she some da^-s lays 

 two hundred'-^, she will place two 

 or three eggs in a single cell. But 

 because only one bee can be 

 hatched in a cell the worker bees 

 provide for the remaining eggs and 

 bring them to other cells. Still one 

 has not observed that at any time 

 there have been more eggs in a 

 royal cell. 



2 We now know that she lays over 

 2000.— Ed. 



The Qgg is exceedingly white, 

 and a few larger than the little egg 

 of the muck-fly, of a thin, smooth 

 form and filled with membranes 

 containing a whitish fluid. The 

 eggs from which the drones are 

 produced are somewhat larger than 

 those from which the worker bees 

 proceed, and somewhat yellower in 

 color than the former which are of 

 a clear white, but which diiference 

 is not very marked. 



The egg remains in the above- 

 named position four days when it 

 receives its first life, and then a 

 small, white maggot or worm 

 without feet appears, which seems 

 to be composed of many rings 

 and which curls itself up in the 

 bottom of the cell in the shape of 

 a half-moon, becomes round and 

 remains hanging fast in the fluid. 

 In this position it not only in- 

 creases until one end touches the 

 other in the form of a ring, but also 

 until it attains such a size that it 

 fills the bottom of the cell. Dur- 

 ing this time the worm or larva of 

 the coming bee is kept within the 

 cluster of old bees for warmth, and 

 often during the day is furnished 

 with proper food which is a bright, 

 liquid food-jelly, consisting of pol- 

 len and hone}', with which the}' prob- 

 ably mix water, the salt portions, 

 and a juice which is similar to the 

 sap which flows from the oak-tree. 

 It has an acid-sweet taste, and is 

 at first, in short, before the cover- 

 ing of the worm, yellow. For they 

 accommodate the jelly-food accord- 

 ing to the age of the worm. In the 

 beginning it is like a white pap, al- 

 most without taste like a thick 



