234 BEES AND BEE-KEEPING. 



and how is this given ? My previous explanations 

 have made evident that the spermatozoa glide, not 

 into a plain tubular cavity to meet the descending 

 egg, but into a pouch contrived of curiously formed 

 folds of the lining membrane of the common 

 oviduct, and which, if stained with picro-carmine, 

 takes up picric acid and becomes yellower than the 

 oviduct proper, whilst its surface is dotted over with 

 linear patches of setae (or bristles), from two to six 

 in a patch, and from 10 ^ 00 in. to g-^-g-in. in length. 

 Its structure is particularly difficult to examine, but 

 it has three main cross duplicatures (p, Fig. 45) of 

 an extremely attenuated membrane, which give to 

 it somewhat the form of three joints of a lobster's 

 tail, while it is only slightly wider than the diameter 

 of the egg ; and I have little doubt that here the 

 latter is delayed when a female is to be produced, 

 and brought into contact with spermatozoa delivered 

 into the right position by the channel k, k (Fig. 

 44), whilst the eggs from which drones are evolved 

 are carried down the path (d, Fig. 45) by the side 

 of the pouch to the termination of the duct, and so 

 escape all contact with the fertilising threads. 



The oviducts are highly organised, containing a 

 most beautiful system of longitudinal and transverse 

 muscular fibres, repletely provided with nerve 

 twigs, evidently giving to the oviducts the most com- 

 plete control of the eggs which are to pass through 

 them, while they are not without strong indications 

 of two specialised paths [b and c), one towards the 

 fertilising pouch and the other to its side. Near the 

 junction of the oviducts, also, there are two thin 



