38 PHYSIOLOGY AND BEEEDIlirG. 



have become impregnated. All this indicates, if it does 

 not prove conclusively, that all drone eggs are unimpreg- 

 nated. There is still another indication that they are not 

 impregnated. The Italian queen that has met the native 

 drone, and brings forth a mixed progeny of workers — 

 half Italian and half native — will produce just as pure 

 drones as her mother, or one that has never met the drone. 

 Does not this militate against any theory that the vivify- 

 ing influence is incorporated with the egg in its formation ? 



on the side, half way to the bottom, and others were on dliFerent parts of the 

 bottom. Some of the cells contained larvie pretty well advanced, and that 

 eventually matured into apparently perfect drones. A day or two after, on tak- 

 ing out a comb, I found a worker in the very act of laying. Her abdomen was 

 inserted its whole length, her head, tliorax, and wings being all that was visible 

 of her body. She was not disturbed at all by the removal of the comb, but con- 

 tinued the important operation of depositing an egg, the gravity of her counte- 

 nance indicating that she considered herself the important personage of the colony 



rT^^ f f 1 ^ 

 f^ W ^ ^" * 



i t f ^ f \ " t f ^ 



Fig. 6. — COME SHOWING THE DIFFERENT SHAPE OF CELLS "WHEN AN AT- 

 TEMPT IS MADE TO RAISE A QUEEN FROM DRONE BROOD. 



by being elevated to tlie dignity of becoming the mother of a drone. I found 

 ihat ttie length of time required by her to deposit an egg was three or four times 

 greater tlian that usually occupied by a queen. A day or two after, I caught 

 three dignified matrons at one time engaged in this all important and not-to-be 

 deferred business, and afterwards observed several others thus occupied. I 

 noticed that the phenomenon was usually produced by keeping the litlle colony 



