140 ANALOGICAL REMARKS OF KIRBY. 



with a turban or a mitre, were distinguished by the thinness 

 of it. 



Now we are fully disposed to award to Mr. Kirby all the 

 merit which his reasoning deserves ; nor will we here stop 

 to inquire, whether, when he compiled the article on the bee, 

 in the second volume of his " Introduction to Entomology," 

 he had been accustomed for some time previously to go bare- 

 headed like the Egyptians, by which an extraordinary thick- 

 ness in his skull had been produced ; but we shall here sim- 

 ply confine ourselves to the question, that although the local 

 circumstances mentioned by Kirby may have had a decided 

 influence on the physical constitution of man in Persia and 

 Egypt, still there is no proof existing that a particular diet 

 will alter the sexual character of the individual, or that the 

 masculine gender of an Egyptian or a Persian was ever 

 metamorphosed into the feminine, accordingly as he might 

 be fed on dates, rats, or royal jelly. The egg from which the 

 larva emanates, that is selected by the jelly-makers to be- 

 come a queen, was at the moment of its deposition that of a 

 common sterile worker, and would, at the period of its full 

 development, have produced, according to Huber and Kirby, 

 a female bee, decidedly sterile. On the bees, however, form- 

 ing a resolution to convert the sterile female into one of the 

 most surprising fecundity, and thereby changing in the most 

 direct manner its original nature, it is merely necessary to 

 supply the larva with an extraordinary dose of jelly, by 

 which simple act, the odium of sterility is removed, and the 

 blessing of fertility imparted. The entire innate organic 

 structure of the insect undergoes a decided metamorphosis ; 

 and this creative power is given to a few individuals in the 

 hive, by virtue of a certain aliment, to alter and convert the 

 original disposition of the egg, and transform it into an 

 insect of a wholly different character, faculties, and proper- 

 ties, than it would have been, if such aliment had not been 



