EGG-LAYING. 7 



wards it never takes place. This is one of tlie most 

 extraordinary things in bee-history. A queen bee lives 

 four years, and lays a vast number of eggs — at least 

 2000 a-day — ^in the heat of summer, for months together, 

 every year. We guess that a healthy fertile queen, during 

 her life, lays 800,000 eggs— 200,000 a-year— all duly 

 fecundated, and capable of hatching into young bees, 

 though the queen never meets a drone after the first few 

 days of her existence. 



Egg-Laying. 



This commences from six to ten days after impreg na- 

 tion. "Wbo can think of the laborious and monotonous 

 life of a queen bee without being touched with a feeling 

 of tenderness and compassion for her? This queenly 

 creature leads a life of toil. Six months of the year does 

 she move from comb to comb, and from cell to cell. In 

 thus travelling up and down the hive, she is seeking 

 empty cells in which to lay her eggs, which are of some 

 size and substance, being in shape somewhat akin to 

 birds' eggs. When she finds an empty cell, she inserts 

 her abdomen, and drops an egg, which adheres to the 

 bottom of the ceU by the small end. The eggs come so 

 fast from her that she has neither time nor strength to 

 lay one in each cell : often two, and sometimes three, 

 drop into one cell. The bees remove the supernumeraries 

 that are found in some cells, and fill the cells that have 

 no eggs in them. This point or statement has been dis- 

 puted by one or two apiarians, but never disproved. We 

 have known eggs removed from cells to other cells hun- 

 dreds, if not thousands of times. There is, we admit, 

 great difficulty in seeing the transit of eggs from cells to 

 cells ; but on examination of combs after queens have 

 gone over them, empty cells may be found near to other 



