16 
pliky's katueal histoet. 
[Book XI. 
qnickly receive injury from the taint thus contracted : hence 
it is that among the various kinds of honey which are pre- 
served, there is one which is known by the name of acapnon^^ 
CHAP. 16. THE EEPRODUCTIOIir OF BEES. 
How bees generate their young has been a subject of great 
and subtle research among the learned ; seeing that no one has 
ever witnessed any sexual intercourse among these insects. 
Many persons have expressed an opinion that they must be 
produced from flowers, aptly and artistically arranged by 
IsTature ; while others, again, suppose that they are produced 
from an intercourse with the one which is to be found in every 
swarm, and is usually called the king. This one, they say, is 
the only male^^ in the hive, and is endowed with such ex- 
traordinary proportions, that it may not become exhausted 
in the performance of its duties. Hence it is, that no off- 
spring can be produced without it, all the other bees being 
females,^^ and attending it in its capacity of a male, and not 
as their leader. This opinion, however, which is otherwise 
not improbable, is sufHciently refuted by the generation of the 
drones. For on what grounds could it possibly happen that 
the same intercourse should produce an offspring part of which 
is perfect, and part in an imperfect state ? The first surmise 
which I have mentioned would appear, indeed, to be much 
nearer the truth, were it not the case that here another diffi- 
culty meets us— the circumstance that sometimes, at the, ex- 
tremity of the combs, there are produced bees of a larger size, 
which put the others to flight. This noxious bee bears the 
name of wstrus,^^ and how is it possible that it should ever be 
produced, if it is the fact that the bees themselves form their 
progeny r^^ 
A fact, however^ that is well ascertained, is, that bees sit,^^ 
like the domestic fowl, that which is hatched by them at 
^ " TJnsmoked " honey. 
It takes place while they are on the wing. 
The only prolific female, in reality. 
Some unprolific females and some males, in reality. 
50 Cuvier thinks that either hornets, or else the drones, must be alluded 
to. Virgil, Georg. B. iv. 1. 197, et seg,, is one of those who think that 
bees are produced from flowers. 
I. e. from flowers. 
^2 They arrange the eggs in the cells, but they cannot be said to sit 
