NATURAL HISTORY OF THE HONEY-BEE. 41 



excitement, and the whole colony were almost as much 

 agitated as though they were swarming. After she had 

 been in the second hive a short time, I found that she had 

 laid a number of drone-eggs. They were deposited near 

 the bottom and edge of the comb, in cells a little larger 

 than the worker-size, and which the bees had begun to 

 lengthen, to adapt them to the growth of their occupants. 

 There was no other brood in the hive. On the 9th of 

 August, I found the combs nearly filled with worker- 

 brood, in a state considerably less advanced than the 

 drones. Is there any reason to doubt that these drone- 

 eggs were laid by the queen before, and the worker-eggs 

 after her impregnation ? 



In Italy there is a variety of the honey-bee differing in 

 size and color from the common kind. If a queen of this 

 variety is crossed with the common drones, her drone- 

 progeny will be Italian, and her worker-brood a cross 

 between the two ; thus showing that the kind of drones 

 she will produce has no dependence on the male by which 

 she is fecundated. 



It appears from recent discoveries in physiology, that to 

 impregnate the ovum of an animal it is necessary that the 

 spermatozoa should not simply come in contact with it, 

 but actually enter into it through a small opening. In 

 applying this discovery to bees, Prof. Siebold, of Germany, 

 dissected a number of worker-eggs, and found in each 

 from one to three spermatozoa ; while he found none in 

 dissecting drone-eggs. 



Dr. Donhoff, of Germany, in the Summer of 1 855, reared 

 a worker-larva3 from a drone-egg,* which he had artificially 

 impregnated. 



* I attempted to do this In 1852 ; but to my great disappointment, the bees 

 removed or devoured all the eggs thus treated ; owing as I then supposed to their 

 unwillingness to raise workers in drone-cells. If some of the oggs just deposited 

 in a pioee of drone-comb are touched with a fine brush dipped ia *.he diluted 



