Bacillus alvei. By Messrs. F. Cheshire & Watson Ckeyne. 587 



some instances actually dying out in spite of every effort to save 

 them, and that in America alone the losses through it had risen to 

 very many thousands annually. 



Continuing the investigation, I found that a large proportion 

 of imago workers and drones die of this disease if they are raised 

 in infected stocks, and that this explained the marked dwindling in 

 numbers in a colony from the very incidence of an attack. But 

 further, if workers and drones are liable, why may not queens be so 

 also ? and if this be possible, may we not get a solution of certain 

 peculiarities with which bee-keepers of experience are familiar, e. g. 

 some months earlier I had imported some queens from Italy, one of 

 which was inserted into a stock which quickly after developed foul 

 brood, while the queen lived on six or seven weeks only. In 

 addition, if the queen may be infected, why not the egg ? In the 

 case of pebrine this had already been proved to be the case. The 

 bee's egg is to the size of the bacillus enormous ; its diameter of 

 '36 mm, and its length of 1 "8 mm. would enable it to accommo- 

 date 100,000,000 spores of this organism, which stands to the egg 

 itself as a single drop to 1500 gallons. Following this line, and 

 knowing that foul brood had in some cases appeared to be more 

 particularly destructive amongst the smaller larvae, I not unnaturally 

 judged that in these cases possibly the egg contained the germs of 

 the disease at the time of deposition. I communicated my suspicions 

 to several owners of large numbers of colonies, and explained what 

 would be the probable peculiarities of genetic foul brood if such a 

 form really existed. Mr. Hart, of Stockbridge, soon after sent me 

 a queen from a hive which presented the indicated symptoms, vi25. 

 the early death of the larvae in most cases ; the earnestness of the 

 bees in attempting to raise a new queen, although their numbers 

 were so small that swarming* was out of the question, this 

 earnestness seeming to indicate that they were conscious of some 

 unfitness about the mother, which they desired to remedy by dis- 

 placing her, and lastly a continuance of thoir hospitahty to drones 

 at a period of the season when other stocks have destroyed theirs. 

 The queen was fortunately alive at her arrival, and I forthwith 

 commenced a careful dissection. Having removed the left air-sac 

 (which lies within the first and second abdominal rings), which 

 was very much above the average size, a constant indication as I 

 have found it of the presence of bacilli, I came upon the ovary, of 

 which 1 had upon previous occasions removed many dozens. This 

 one was abnormally yellow and very soft, so that it was difficult 

 to detach it from the larger external trachea) without tearing. 

 I separated an ovarian tube and placed it under a second Micro- 

 scope using 250 diameters, and at once saw four or five bacilli 



• IIr;!iltl]y BtockH only raise new queens in Uio prospect of swarming, or wlioii 

 the mother i» fading through ago. 



