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LXII.—VOLUNTARY ACT OF SELF-DESTRUCTION BY 
THE WORKER BEE, sy J. H. LUBY, C.E. 
Communicated by Rev. 8. Haventoy, M.D., F.RB.S. 
[Read March 15th, 1880. ] 
No. I. 
Kingscourt, 13th January, 1579. 
Dear Dr. Havautron,—You have asked me to state what 
observations I have taken on what I told you I believed to be the 
“general” ending of the worker bee’s existence—namely, “The 
voluntary act of casting itself out to die by exposure to the 
elements.” 
In endeavouring to carry out your wishes I would first say 
that I shall confine myself to the “normal” or “ ordinary” condi- 
tions under which they appear to act in this way. I do so for 
this reason, that although they also seem to be forced to it under 
special circumstances, too many collateral issues are therein 
involved to be able to consider them here. 
I may just mention that the “act” seems in these special cases 
to be more or less of a wholesale nature, and to be participated 
in by the young and able as well as by the old and decrepit. I 
came across a very curious case of this a couple of months ago, 
and made an experiment by which I not only succeeded in 
arresting the manifestly deliberate intention of the bees, but fixed 
(to my mind) the “cause” in that particular instance. But I 
must confine my account to the one point. 
It is now more than two years since I first observed and 
experimented on thissubject. These observations were all taken 
during the winter (or non-working) months, as it would be 
obviously very hard to determine the matter while the bees are 
at full work in summer time, and for that reason I could not 
regard them as conclusive. 
This summer, however, I have been so fortunate as to hit on a 
proceeding on the part of the worker bee which has thoroughly 
convinced me that their practice in this respect (namely, “ Volun- 
