Character of ^ueen. 97 



fast of them. If the queen find the cell to her liking, she 

 turns about, inserts her abdomen, and in an instant the tiny 

 egg is glued in position (Fig. 24, 3) to the bottom of the 

 cell. 



The queen, when considered in relation to the other bees 

 of the colony, possesses a surprising longevity. It is not 

 dncommon for her to attain the age of three years in the 

 full possession of her powers, while queens have been 

 known to do good work for five years. Lubbock hasqueen 

 ants in his nests that are thirteen years old, and still they are 

 vigorous layers. Queens, often at the expiration of one, 

 two, three or four years, depending on their vigor and ex- 

 cellence, either cease to be fertile, or else become impotent 

 to lay impregnated eggs — the spermatheca having become 

 emptied of its sperm-cells. In such cases the workers 

 usually supersede the queen, that is, they rear a new queen 

 before all the worker-eggs are gone, and then destroy the 

 old one. 



It sometimes happens, though rarely, that a fine-looking 

 queen, with the full-formed ovaries and large spermatheca 

 well-filled with male fluid, will deposit freely, but none of 

 the eggs will hatch. Readers of bee-papers know that I 

 have frequently received such for dissection. The first I 

 ever got was a remarkably fine looking Italian, received 

 from the late Dr. Hamlin, of Tennesse. AH such queens 

 that I have examined seem perfect, even though scrutinized 

 with a high power objective. We can only say that the 

 egg is at fault, as frequently transpires with higher animals, 

 even to the highest. These females are barren ; through 

 some fault with the ovaries, the eggs grown therein are 

 sterile. To detect just what is the trouble with the egg is 

 a very difficult problem, if it is capable of solution at all. 

 I have tried to determine the ultimate cause, but without 

 success. Cases have also been observed where mated and 

 impregnated queens fail to lay impregnated eggs. Here 

 the delicate organism of the spermatheca and its duct is at 

 fault. Queens that have been chilled, as shown by Siebold, 

 Leuckart and our own Langsti-oth, are often made drone- 

 layers — that is, they only lay unimpregnated eggs. I have 

 also had one queen that produced many hermaphroditic 



