80 MANUAL OF THE APIABY. 



would accord with what we know of muscular organs. 

 Berlepsch believed that a queen that commenced lajring as a 

 Yirgin could never lay impregnated eggs, even though she 

 afterwards mated. Langstroth thought that he had observed 

 to the contrary. 



If the queen be observed after a successful "wedding tour," 

 she will be seen to bear the marks of success in the pendant 

 drene appendages, consisting of the penis, the yellow cul-de- 

 sacks, and the hanging thread-like ducts. 



It is not at all likely that a queen, after she has met a 

 drone, ever leaves the hive again except that she leaves with 

 a swarm. Some of the observing apiarists think that an old 

 queen may be again impregnated. The fact that queens, 

 "with clipped wings, are as long fertile as others, makes me 

 think that cases which have led to such conclusions are capable 

 of other explanation. 



If the queen lays eggs before meeting the drones, or if for 

 any reason she fails to mate, her eggs will only produce male 

 bees. This strange anomaly — development of the eggs with- 

 out impregnation — was discovered and proved by Dzierzon, in 

 1845. Dr. Dzierzon, who, as a student of practical and scien- 

 tific apiculture, must rank with the great Huber, is a Roman 

 Catholic priest of Carlesmarkt, G-ermany. This doctrine — 

 called parthenogenesis, which means produced from a virgin 

 — is still doubted by some quite able bee-keepers, though the 

 proofs are irrefragable : 1st. Unmated queens will lay eggs 

 ,that will develop, but drones always result. 2d. Old queens 

 often become drone-layers, but examination shows that the 

 spermatheca is void of seminal fluid. Such an examination 

 was first made by Prof. Siebold, the great German anato- 

 mist, in 1843, and later by Leuckart and Leidy. I have 

 myself made several such examinations. The spermatheca 

 can easily be seen by the unaided vision, and by crushing it 

 on a glass slide, by compressing with a thin glass cover, the 

 ■dilFerence between the contained fluid in the virgin and im- 

 pregnated queen is very patent, even with a low power. In 

 the latter it is more viscid and yellow, and the vesicle more 

 •distended. By use of a high power, the active spermatozoa 

 or germ-cells become visible. 3d. Eggs in drone-cells are 

 found by the microscopist to be void of the sperm-cells, which 



