176 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1792. 



and the bees were allowed to work great part of the summer: the bees were ex- 

 amined one by one, but no drone could be discovered, and yet the queens were 

 impregnated, and laid their eggs*. The above experiment was repeated with 

 pieces of comb, containing eggs only, in 6 boxes, but no preparations were 

 made towards producing a queen -|-. The experiment of producing a queen bee 

 from a maggot was repeated every month of the year, even in November J. A 

 maggot 3 days old was procured from a friend, inclosed in an ordinary cell, and 

 shut up with a piece of comb, containing eggs and maggots. That 3 days old 

 was formed into a queen, and all the other maggots and eggs were destroyed^. 

 In above 100 experiments a queen has been formed from maggots 3 days old||." 

 Wilhelmi observes, that a queen cell, which is made while the bees are shut 

 up, is formed by breaking down 3 common cells into one, when the maggot is 

 placed in the centre, after which the sides are repaired. Al young queen lately 

 hatched was put into a hive, which had been previously ascertained to contain no 

 drones, and whose queen was removed; and yet the young queen laideggs^. In 

 repeating Mr. Schirach's experiment, he shut up 4 pieces of comb, with one 

 maggot in each; after 2 days the maggots were all dead, and the bees had de- 

 sisted from labour**. A piece of comb, from which all the eggs and maggots 

 had' been removed, was shut up with some honey, and a certain number of 

 workers; in a short time they became very busy, and on the evening of the 2d 

 day 300 eggs were found in the cells -f-f-. He repeated this experiment with the 

 same result, and the bees were left to themselves: they placed queen maggots in 

 the queen cells, newly constructed, and others in male cells: the rest were left 

 undisturbed. He again took 2 pieces of comb, which contained neither eggs 

 nor maggots, and shut them up with a certain number of workers and carried 

 the box into a stove: next evening, one of the pieces of con)b contained several 

 eggs, and the beginning of a royal cell, that was empty, 



* Here is a wonder of another kind: queens laying eggs, which we must suppose Mr. Schirach 

 meant we should believe they hatched, without the influence of the male. — + Why eggs, which we 

 must conceive hatched, and produced maggots, did not form queens, one cannot imagine. — J In 

 which month, as bees never swarm, there could be no occasion for mothers, or supernumerary 

 queens, and still each experiment produced a handsome queen. This is as singular an observation as 

 any. In this country, as in all similar ones, bees hardly breed after July, and by the beginning of 

 Sept. there is hardly a chrysalis to be seen; yet these bred till Nov. and even laid eggs. — § Why did 

 the bees destroy them in this experiment, and not in others? — 1| The working bees, from the above 

 experiments, are considered as all females, though the ovaria are too small for examination. — It 

 would appear that a maggot 3 days old was of the best age for this experiment, yet one should have 

 conceived that a maggot ^ days old would soon be fit. — f There is no mystery in tliis; but did tliey 

 hatch? — ** This is the mostprobable event in the whole experiments. — ++ This would show that 

 labourers c-an be changed into queens at will, and that neither they nor their eggs require to be im- 

 pregnated; if lliis was the case, there would be no occasion for all the push in making a queen or a 

 male. — Orig. 



