THE WORKERS. 39 



only to similar sources of supply. This fact may be 

 verified by any one who will take the trouble to notice 

 in field or garden the customs of the hive-bee. It 

 does not seem to be the habit of wild bees thus to 

 confine themselves to particular flowers for each 

 journey they make. The importance of this circum- 

 stance in the case of our domesticated species, and its 

 influence on the vegetable world, will be noted in a 

 later chapter, when we discuss the relation of bees to 

 flowers. 



We have before alluded to the very remarkable 

 phenomenon occasionally occurring to the great 

 annoyance of the bee-keeper, namely, the develop- 

 ment in a worker of the power of laying eggs, which 

 eggs will produce nothing but drones, so that the 

 population of the hive dwindles, and becomes extinct. 

 Various suggestions have been made as to the reason 

 of this faculty appearing. A very plausible idea is 

 that some of the "royal jelly" is occasionally, and 

 possibly by mistake, given to a larva in the neighbour- 

 hood of a queen-cell, and this stimulating food pro- 

 duces a partial development of laying power. A 

 second possibility is that sometimes a worker-larva 

 in too forward a condition is transferred to a queen- 

 cell, and owing to the difference of treatment not 

 having been begun early enough, an imperfect and 

 nondescript kind of bee results. Some corroboration 

 of this may perhaps be found in a curious fact, which 

 has been several times noted, and published in 

 the British Bee-Journal, viz., the finding of workers 

 hatched in queen-cells. It would be difficult to 

 imagine such an abnormal event, unless unusual 

 circumstances had occurred to the young larva. 



