]\Ir Dunbar on the Conversion of the Larvte 
Af„t. IV. — Observations on Bees^ and particularly on the con-^ 
version of the Larv^ of Worldng^Bees into Queen-Bees. 
By the Reverend Mr Dunbar of Applegarth. Commu- 
nicated by the Author. * 
J?\mong my experiments in the year 1822 , there were two 
rather of an interesting nature, one of them confirming beyond 
the possibility of a doubt, the remarkable and often-questioned 
fact in the natural history of bees, of their having the power of 
converting the larva of a working-bee into a queen, when cir- 
cumstances require such an expedient ; — the other experiment 
is completely practical in its nature, and the consequence of the 
one first mentioned. 
Experiment I.- — In a communication inserted in the Philoso- 
phical Journal, I mentioned an instance which I had witnessed 
of the formation of a queen from the egg of a working bee ; — 
a discovery for which Natural History is indebted to Schirach, 
and wliich had been repeatedly verified by the celebrated Huber. 
Possessing a hive extremely well fitted for experiments of this 
kind, and which I have named the Mirror-Hive, from its exact 
resemblance to that piece of household furniture, I set about re- 
peating this experiment in such a way as to put the matter out 
of all doubt. Huber had already done this so accurately that 
no person at all conversant in this branch of natural history 
could reasonably have felt any hesitation on the subject, pro- 
vided there was no favourite theory to be upheld. But Huber 
was a foreigner, and I have heard it alleged against him by some, 
that he was a man of a very vivid imagination, — and by others, 
that being defective in his eye-sight, he had given credit on the 
word of his assistant to reports of discoveries unfounded in 
fact. Huish, an Englishman, has published a Treatise on Bees, 
in which he treats with much petulance and ridicule the theory 
of the formation of artificial queens, so warmly supporced by 
Huber ; and I observe in the London list of new publications, 
a pamphlet announced by him in answer to my paper on that 
subject in this Journal. The following results of an experiment 
I made last summer, will, I presume, be regarded as a conclu- 
* Rcud before the Wernerian Natural History Society, 15th November 1823. 
