on the Sex' of Bees. 27 
having no doubt been flain in the engagement. The 
manner in which I account for this event is as follows : 
the great delire of perpetuating their fpecies, which is 
mofl: obfervable in thefe infects, and to which end the 
concurrence of the males feems fo abfolutely neceflary, 
made them defert their own habitation where no males 
were left, in order to fix their refidence in a new one, in 
which, there being a good flock of males, they might the 
better accomplifh their purpofe. If this does not yet 
eftablifh the reader’s faith of the neceffity of the males 
bearing a fhare in the fecundation of the ova , the next 
experiment cannot I prefume fail to convince him. 
I took the brood-comb which, as I obferved before, had 
not been impregnated; I divided it into two parts; one I 
placed under a glafs-bell N° 1 . with honey-comb for the 
bees’ food; I took care to leave a queen, but no drones, 
among the common bees I confined in it. The other piece 
of brood-comb I placed under another glafs-bell N° 2 . 
with a few drones, a queen, and a number of common 
bees proportioned to the fize of the glafs ; the reft I dif- 
pofed of as before. The refult was, that in the glafs N° 
1 . no impregnation happened ; the eggs remained in the 
fame ftate they were in when put into the glafs; and, 
upon giving the bees their liberty on the feventh day, 
they all flew away, as was found to be the cafe in the for- 
E 2 
mer 
