20 THEORY OF MADEMOISELLE JURINE. 



thing of that kind must take place, seeing that the creation 

 of some thousands of males in a hive cannot be designed by 

 nature without apportioning to them some particular func- 

 tions ; nor is it less strange that the produce of these eggs 

 should be restricted to the masculine gender, leaving the 

 queen to produce the female eggs and another kind of male 

 (the drones), which she, for some particular reason, mono- 

 polizes to herself. Are these fertile workers, (for Huber is 

 silent on the subject) at the same time, virgins and mothers ? 

 Do they, in imitation of their queen, retire with their para- 

 mours to the woods, or the upper regions of the air, for 

 the purpose of being fecundated ? for in no part of Huber's 

 works do we find that he makes the slightest mention of the 

 manner in which these eggs are fecundated, nor of the kind 

 of cell in which they are bred, nor of the precise functions 

 or destination of their issue. The whole is, in fact, a farrago 

 of paradox, inconsistency, and contradiction ; but, neverthe- 

 less, it is received, on the authority of Huber, into the natural 

 history of the bee, as an indisputable fact. 



In defence of Huber it must be acknowledged that Made- 

 moiselle Jurine determines the common bees to be imper- 

 fect females, for which discovery she is highly extolled by 

 Mr. Rennie, late Professor of Natural History of King's 

 College, London. In despite, however, of the eulogium of 

 the worthy professor, we will venture to affirm, that the the- 

 ory of Mademoiselle Jurine is of a very antiquated date, and 

 promulgated a few hundred years before Mademoiselle took 

 upon herself the arduous task of the anatomy of the bee : 

 she has, however, like her great prototype, forgotten to in- 

 form us in what particular relations of the bee that imperfec- 

 tion lies. Taking, however, Huber and Jurine as our au- 

 thorities, we consider that it lies in the existence of an ovarium 

 of no utility whatever, in which no eggs were ever found or 

 ever known to exist, unless expanded by the accidental ad- 

 ministration of a modicum of royal jelly; but nevertheless, 



