THE ITALIAN BEE. 451 



three-fifth of his young queens proved to be bastardized. 

 He nevertheless continued his efforts steadily, though the 

 proportion of bastardized queens continued to increase, until 

 in July hardly one-tenth of the number bred proved to be of 

 the pure Italian stock. This disproportion was a mystery to 

 him till he observed that on very warm days, when the air 

 is entirely calm, and the sky clear, the drones circumvolate* 

 to unusual distances, and probably the queen's excursions 

 are on such occasions similarly extensive. At least, at this 

 time, the queen of a colony in an Apiary three miles distant, 

 must have been impregnated by a drone from his Apiary, 

 for the progeny she produced was similar to that of a com- 

 mon queen, impregnated by an Italian drone. On the 20lh 

 of August, at which time all the common drones had disap- 

 peared, Berlepsch had 117 fertile young queens, but only 

 28 pure Italian. He preserved his Italian drones from 

 destruction, by removing the queens from the colonies in 

 which drones most abounded, and preventing the breeding of 

 young queens by repeatedly destroying the royal cells con- 

 structed. Thenceforward he found it an easy task to produce 

 Italian queens, because few common drones remained in. 

 other Apiaries, and those no longer made distant excursions, 

 nor did the queens roam so far abroad. He had previously 

 noticed that if late in the season, drones be induced to issue 

 from their hives on fair days, at an earlier hour than they 

 usually come forth, by feeding the colony with warm diluted 

 honey, they will not fly far, and soon return to their domi- 

 ciles. By resorting to this expedient, and injecting some 

 such honey, by means of a syringe, into each hive having 



* I think we shall have to introduce this word in bee-oulture, to de- 

 signate the drone's peculiar style of locomotion when on the wing.. 

 It seems to be " a flight in " pseudo-cycloidal " circles urged." Aris- 

 totle notices this peculiarity in their flight. 



