THE ITALIAN EEB. 443 



of weakness, but suddenly recovered in the following month ; 

 and it was evident that it had supplied itself with a new 

 queen, which had fortunately been impregnated by an Italian 

 drone, as she produced genuine or pure brood. On the 15th 

 of May, 1848, this queen issued with a swarm, and he hoped 

 that, as he had placed the parent hive in a rather isolated 

 location, her successor would be impregnated by an Italian 

 drone. But in this he was doomed to disappointment ; she 

 produced a bastard progeny, while the emigrant queen pro- 

 duced genuine brood, as before. Similar disappoiniments 

 awaited him from year to year, till the date of his second 

 communication, (June, 1851,) when he possessed still only 

 one colony of the pure stock. 



Among the points which he considered as definitely es- 

 tablished by his observations on the Italian bee, are the 

 following : 



1. The queen, if healthy, retains her proper fertility at 

 least three or four years. 



2. The Italian bee is more industrious, and the queen more 

 prolific than the common kind ; because, in a most unfavor- 

 able year, when other colonies produced few swarms, and 

 little honey, his Italian colony produced three swarms, 

 which filled their hives respectively with comb, and together 

 with the parent stock, laid up ample stores for winter : the 

 latter yielding besides a top box well filled with honey. 

 The three young colonies were among the best in his 

 Apiary. 



3. The workers do not, at most, live longer than one year, 

 for though the bees and brood in the parent hive, when the 

 first swarm and old queen left, were of the Italian stock ex- 

 clusively, few of this kind remained in the Fall, and none 

 survived the Winter. 



4. The young queen is impregnated soon after she is es- 



