FERTILE WORKERS AND BLACK BERS. 31 
contorted tube, in its normal posture retained wholly 
within the body, and joined at one end with the sem!- 
nal duct, and at the other with the external orifice. 
For such a tube to be propelled outwards, it would 
appear that the duct must be driven down it so as to 
turn it inside out like a stocking—an act requiring the 
exertion of extraordinary force. It involves a pre- 
ceding inflation of the abdomen, and the two move- 
ments are comparable to the hasty opening and shut- 
ting of a pair of bellows. The result is an internal 
displacement, so violent as to cause an immediate 
rupture to the system; while the act itself appears 
to be quite impossible of accomplishment except 
when the breathing vessels are distended by motion 
upon the wing.* The remaining of the organ within 
the queen’s body is due to the horn-like protuber- 
ances detected upon it by the microscope. 
FERTILE WORKERS AND BLACK BEES. 
Certain anomalous individuals occasionally make 
their appearance in a hive, and especially those 
known as fertile workers. These bees prove on dis- 
section to possess half-developed ovaries capable of 
producing eggs, but no spermatheca for fertilising 
them, and therefore no means in themselves of 
receiving fecundation from the drones. It follows 
that they lay no other than drone eggs—a fact suf- 
ficient in itself to render their presence undesirable 
* This is Professor Leuckart’s very rational explanation of the other- 
wise puzzling circumstance that pairing is never attempted within the 
hive. 
