THE QUEEN. 47 
long. All these wonders rest on the impregnable basis of 
demonstration, and instead of being witnessed only by a 
select few, are now, by the use of the movable-comb hive, 
familiar sights to any bee-keeper who prefers an acquaint- 
ance with facts, to caviling and sneering at the labors of 
others. 
109. The process of rearing queens, to meet some spe- 
cial emergency, is even more wonderful than the one already 
described. If the bees have worker-eggs, or worms not 
more than three days old, they make one large cell out of 
three, by nibbling away the partitions of two cells adjoining 
athird. Destroying the eggs or worms in two of these cells, 
they place before the occupant of the other, the usual food 
of the young queens; and by enlarging its cell, give it ample 
apace for development.* As a security against failure, they 
usually start a number of queen-cells, for several days in 
succession. 
110. Duration or Devetorpment.—The eggs hatch in 
three days after they are laid. The small worm which is 
intended to produce a queen, is six days in its larval state, 
and seven in its transformation into a chrysalis and winged 
insect. These periods are not absolutely fixed; being 
of shorter or longer duration, according to the warmth 
of the hive and the care given by the bees. In from ten to 
sixteen daysf they are in possession of a new queen, in all 
respects resembling one reared in the natural way; while 
the eggs in the adjoining cells, which have been developed 
as workers, are nearly a week longer in coming to maturity. 
111. THe Vircin Queen.—Feeble and pale, in the first 
moments after her birth, the young queen, as soon as she 
* It was a German bee-keeper, Schirach, who discovered that a queen can be 
raised from a worker-egg. (‘‘ The New Natural and Artificial Multiplication 
of Bees,’’ Bautzen, 1761.) 
+ In ten days, if the larva selected is about three days old; in sixteen, if 
newly laid eggs are selected. 
