PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 123 
the drones. This he seems to have learned from keep- 
ers of bees. ‘The kings, says he in another place, are 
the parents of the bees, and the drones their children. 
It is right, he observes again, that the kings (which by 
some were called mothers) should remain within the 
hive unfettered by any employment, because they are 
made for the multiplication of the species?. 'To the 
same purpose Riem of Lauten of the Palatinate Apia- 
rian Society, and Wilhelmi of the Zusatian, affirm that 
the queen lays the eggs which produce the queens and 
workers; and the workers those that produce the drones 
or males>. Aristotle also tells us, that some in his time 
affirmed that the bees (the workers) were the females, 
and the drones the males: an opinion which he combats 
from an analogy pushed rather too far, that nature would 
never give offensive armour to females‘. In another place 
he appears to think that the workers are hermaphrodites : 
—his words are remarkable, and seem to indicate that he 
was aware of the sexes of plants: ** having in themselves,” 
says he, “ dike plants, the male and the female*.” 
Fables and absurdities, however, are not confined to 
the ancients, nor even to those moderns who lived before 
Swammerdam, Maraldi, Reaumur, Bonnet, Schirach, 
John Hunter, Huber, and their followers, by their ob- 
servations and discoveries had thrown so much light 
upon this interesting subject. Even in our own times, 
a Neapolitan professor, Monticelli, asserts, on the autho- 
rity of a certain father Tanoya, that in every hive there 
2 Aristot. wbisupr.c. 21. De Generat. Animal. |. iii. c. 10, where 
there is some curious reasoning upon this subject. 
+ Bonnet, x. 199—. 236--. 
East. Animal Nava G22- 4 De Gencrat. Animal. |. iit. c. 10. 
