44 i INSECTS. 



thorax, and first ring of the abdomen. JV1. Huber conclud s, 

 without any hesitation, that the final cause of the royal Iarven, 

 forming only incomplete coccoons, is, that they may thus be ex- 

 posed to the mortal sting of the first hatched queen, whose instinct 

 leads her instantly to seek the destruction of those that would soon 

 become her rivals ; and he calls upon us to admire the providence 

 of nature, in thus exposing the royal larves to fatal danger. 



In the close of the letter, we have an account of an experiment 

 instituted to determiue the influence which the size of the cells 

 might have on the size of the bees produced in them. All the 

 larves were removed from a comb of drone's cells, and the larves 

 of workers substituted in their place. The bees,, it may be re. 

 marked, immediately shewed that they were aware of the change 

 which had been effected ; for they did not close the cells with the 

 convex covering always placed over the males, but gave them quite 

 a flat top. The result proved, that the size of the cells does not 

 materially influence the size of the bees; or, at least, that although 

 a small cell may cramp the size of the worker, yct 9 that workers 

 bred in large cells do not exceed the ordinary bulk. 



Upon the subject of swarming, M. Huber commences with an 

 interesting account of the hatching of the queen-bee. When the 

 pupa is about to change into the perfect insect, the bees render the 

 cover of the cell thinner, by gnawing away part of the wax ; and 

 with so much nicety do they perform this operation, that the cover 

 at last becomes pellucid, owing to its extreme thinness. This must 

 not only facilitate the exit of the fly, but M. Huber remarks, it 

 may possibly be useful in permitting the evaporation of the super, 

 abundant fluids of the nymph. After the transformation is com- 

 plete, the young queens would, in common course, immediately 

 emerge from their cells, as workers and drones do ; but the bees 

 always keep them prisoners for some days in their cells, supplying 

 them in the mean time with honey for food ; a small hole being 

 made in the door of each cell, through which the confined bee 

 extends its proboscis to receive it. The royal prisoners continually 

 utter a kind of song, the modulations of which are said to vary. 

 The final cause of this temporary imprisonment, it is suggested, 

 may possibly be, that they may be able to take flight at the instant 

 they are liberated. When a young queen at last gets out, she 

 meets with rather an aukward reception ; she is pulled, bitten, and 



