ARTIFICIAL SWARMING. 
20] 
duced four or five hundred bees to leave their hive, and 
enter a glass-box, containing a small piece of comb. At 
first, they were in great agitation, but from the moment 
that he presented a new queen the tumult ceased, and the 
stranger was received with all respect. 
“I do not dispute the truth of this experiment, but 
Reaumur’s bees were too much removed from their natural 
condition to allow him to judge of their instincts and dis¬ 
positions. He has himself observed, that their industry 
and activity are affected by reducing their numbers too 
much. To render such an experiment truly conclusive, it 
must be made in a populous hive; and on removing the 
native queen, the stranger must be immediately substituted 
in her place.” 
It would seem, from his use of the word immediately , 
that Huber must have been aware of the fact, that if a 
strange queen is given to a colony, before its agitation is 
calmed down (p. 158), and before royal cells are begun, 
she will usually be well received. If the bees of a colony 
are made to fill themselves with honey, by drumming, 
smoking, or giving them liquid sweets, and often, if they 
are removed to a new stand, they will readily accept of 
any queen offered them, in place of their own. 
Bees, in possession of a fertile queen, are often quite 
reluctant to accept of an unimpregnated one in her stead ; 
indeed, it requires much experience to be able to give a 
strange queen to a colony, and yet be sure of securing for 
her a good reception. In several instances, the workers 
have stung a strange queen to death, while I was holding 
her in my fingers, to be able to remove her if she was 
not kindly welcomed. To prevent accidents, it will bo 
wef. to confine a queen — when given to a strange colony 
— in what the Germans call a “ queen-cage,” which may 
