FOREIGN BEES. 28? 



are of opinion, that he picks out only the drones, 

 and never injures the working-hees. Be that as it 

 may, he certainly gives a preference to one bee, and 

 one species of insect over another." 



Advancing southwards, we fall in with the bees 

 of Carolina, Florida, Louisiana, &c. If Latreille he 

 correct and we are disposed to think he is these 

 are still of the European species ; for he tells us, that 

 they extend from the northern States as far south as 

 the Antilles. In the rich provinces ahove named, 

 bees are reported to increase with such rapidity, that 

 nothing but the most satisfactory proofs can entitle 

 the report to credit. A striking instance of this 

 rapid increase is given in Feburier's Treatise on 

 Bees. M. Bozc, the French Consul in Carolina, 

 walking one morning in the woods adjoining his 

 house, found a swarm of bees which the negroes had 

 just deprived of its honey and wax. He succeeded 

 in getting it to enter his hat, brought it home, and 

 put it into a hive. By the end of autumn, it had 

 yielded eleven swarms, and these had, one with an- 

 other, produced as many more ; so that at the end 

 of the year he had twenty-two ! besides losing several 

 for want of hives to lodge them. 



In the island of Cuba, their multiplication is said 

 to be still more extraordinary; so much so, that 

 though they have not existed there above seventy 

 years, thousands of swarms perish yearly from not 

 finding suitable places to settle in. They were intro- 

 duced into this island in 1763, by some emigrants 

 from Florida ; and such was the rapidity with which 



