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In the simple hive, we find from one hundred to four or 
five hundred drones, in proportion to the number of t 
neuters, or working bees; in the double hive, or hive 
two stories, we find from eight to nine hundred; but in 
pyramidal, or hive of three stories, we find from a the 
sand to eleven hundred, and always proportioned to th 
number of the neuters in the colony. ei 
The construction of cells advances in proportion to t 
number of neuters or workers, and the laying of the que 
in proportion to the number of cells; the number of dron 
should be in like proportion to fecundate the eggs. 
The queen can lay four or five hundred eggs in less th 
a day, but the work of fecundation, by the drones, is i 
finitely more laborious, and for its execution, requires 
ereater number of this species. ‘Thus nature, always wi 
and provident, regulates the number of drones by that of 
the neuters, that all the operations of the colony may go 
on with the utmost unanimity and harmony. 
The drone has no offensive armour, like the neuters. 
the place where the sting of the latter is placed, is fou 
the orifice, or sheath, which encloses the facultative org 
for fecundating the eggs. co 
_ As drones of different sizes have been found in the sam 
hive, it has by some been alleged, that they were endowed 
with different faculties and functions. From careful obser- 
vation, I have discovered, that there is no such difference, 
and the variety of size arises only from the difference 
age, between those hatched early in spring and those hate 
ed later. : | 
Mr. Braw, an English observer, discovered, before I did, 
that the drones introduced their posterior extremities inte 
the cells, where the queen had laid her eggs. That they 
there emitted a whitish fluid, thicker than honey, bet with 
out its sweetness. ‘This philosopher adds, that all the egg 
bedewed with this fluid, were fecundated, and those which 
were not, were sterile. Z 
_ ‘There is a fact, which I have verified, and which every 
amateur thay also verify, by enclosing swarms of bees in 
_ glass hives, or bottles of transparent glass. They may soon 
perceive the regular movements of the drones in the sui 
of the queen, fecundating the eggs which she has lai 
This labour of the drones is easily observed, from sg 
o’clock in the morning till noon. » 
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