and its Economic Management. i8i 



accomplished as ever. I have given this subject much study and 

 have made more extensive experiments than perhaps any other 

 apiarist ; but so far it appears that nothing of practical utility is 

 to be gained where a succession of queens is required on a scale 

 sufficiently large to enable one to offer them for sale. I had no 

 difficulty some years since in getting bees to fly freely in a green- 

 house, 20 feet by 8 feet, with the glass covered on the inside with 

 wire screens. The space was too limited for the object in view, 

 and I then put up a canvas-covered flight room about 30 feet by 

 8 feet, and another still larger — 50 feet by 10 feet ; but so far my 

 success has been too limited to speak hopefully of the project. 

 That it is to be done I am quite aware, but on a scale all too 

 expensive for one to hope for full repayment ; as the number of 

 nuclei that can be placed in even a large confined space must be 

 very limited. The drones, workers, and queens fly freely, and 

 the latter very seldom miss their own hive, providing they have 

 never flown anywhere but indoors. 



Two years since I turned my attention to fertilization by hand. 

 Mr. Cheshire's very minute explanation and illustration of the 

 drone organs led me to believe that the whole thing could now 

 be accomplished. I was soon to learn that the trouble was not 

 in the drone, but that the whole difficulty lay with the queen. 

 Her organs had not been so faithfully described, and no writ er 

 as yet appeared to know in what manner the union takes place 

 naturally. Finding some trouble in inducing the queens to allow 

 the common cavity to be opened at the extremit)' of the body, I 

 constructed a very delicate instrument wherein I placed the queen 

 head downwards, so that she was fixed for any length of time 

 without injury and at the same time could get plenty of air. On 

 two opposite sides I arranged very fine and weak springs, so 

 formed that the body of the queen could be held open suffidentiy 

 that one could plainly see (i) the termination of the alimentary 

 canal, (2) the termination of the oviduct — the vulva, and 

 (3) between these the sting, which itself hes between (4) the 



