On the Threshold of the Hive 



bee ; and all that we can gather there- 

 from — which indeed is exceedingly little 

 — we may find condensed in the fourth 

 book of Virgil's Georgics. 



The real history" of the bee begins in 

 the seventeenth century, with the discov- 

 eries of the great Dutch savant Swammer- 

 dam. It is well, however, to add this 

 detail, but little known : before Swam- 

 merdam a Flemish naturalist named 

 Clutius had arrived at certain important 

 truths, such as the sole maternity of the 

 queen and her possession of the attributes 

 of both sexes, but he had left these un- 

 proved. Swammerdam founded the^ true 

 methods of scientific investigation ; he 

 invented the microscope, contrived injec- 

 tions to ward off decay, was the first to 

 dissect the bees, and by the discovery of 

 the ovaries and the oviduct definitely fixed 

 the sex of the queen, hitherto looked 

 upon as a king, and threw the whole 

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