15 
for twenty-four hours, one of the queens usually 
lead out a swarm, to avoid the battle. Queens 
are not reared in a hive, unless the hive be desti- 
tute, which may happen from various causes ; the 
old queen may have led out a swarm, or died 
from age or some other cause ; in either case, if 
female eggs are found in the combs, preparation is 
immediately made to supply the defect, by build- 
ing royal cells, which always hang perpendicular 
in the hive ; and this is done by sacrificing three 
of the horizontal cells, and permitting the royal 
cell to occupy their place. 
Mr. Schirach, an eminent naturalist, supposes 
that in certain circumstances the animal destined 
to become a worker may actually be converted 
into a queen, and that this conversion is in the 
power of the bees, by means of a particular mode 
of treatment bestowed on the worm, while in an 
early stage. He thence concludes that every 
queen is originally a worker, which, without the 
particular treatment bestowed, would have re- 
mained a worker, but having undergone this treat- 
ment, it is converted to a queen, and that the bees, 
to attain this conversion, select a worm when 
three days old. 
Many celebrated writers on bees have adopted 
Schirach’s notions with regard to the queen’s ori- 
gin ; but in so doing we must set aside our reas- 
oning powers, and admit that the Almighty, in 
forming the bee, created them male and female 
only, and that the worker is the male and the 
drone the female ; and that the bees seeing the de- 
fect, from the egg of the drone created a sovereign. 
This may appear to the reader to be rather strong 
language, but if we admit the one, we must sub- 
mit to the other. When a queen bee ceases to 
