48 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF AN 



things about these Maids is, that very occa- 

 sionally they think to help their Queen lay 

 eggs in the height of the hatching season, 

 when numbers and heat are very essential; 

 or else in some desperate desire to be wise 

 above all colony law, they think to provide 

 it with a Queen when its sovereign has been 

 overtaken by some accident and is lost, or 

 dead. But not one egg ever hatches into 

 either a Worker or a Queen, since all are 

 unfertile. Only Drones and our colony 

 would be doomed! The third fact is, that 

 just as the Chaps or Drones are the only 

 pure male bees, the Queen is the only pure 

 female. She alone can marry. She alone 

 can lay eggs that are fertile, so that from 

 eggs she does deposit in the cells the colony 

 may develop Workers, Drones, or Queens, 

 according as she has impregnated them 

 when laid, and as the colony purpose de- 

 mands at the time by giving or withholding 

 certain kinds of food, such as Chyle and 

 Royal Jelly, and also building three sizes 



