270 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN’S COMPANION, July 28, 1857. 
lengthened time—ns, for example, twenty-four hours the 
party abstaining should not at first take solid food, but 
either a little broth or oatmeal gruel; after that a little 
li^ht pudding. The Quantities should be small at a time, 
and no full meal should be partaken of until after a day of 
this gradual nourishing has passed. Abstinence from food, 
when the stomach is disordered, is beneficial, and it is very 
objectionable then to tempt the patient to eat. The stomach 
requires rest - - let it have what it needs. We all eat much 
more than nature requires, and Mr. Abernethy was quite 
right in considering that most of our diseases arise from our 
ill-treatment of our stomachs. Every one should read Mr. 
R. Chambers’ complaint, supposed to be uttered by the 
Gastric Juice, the chief agent in digesting our food. The 
human frame can endure total abstinence much longer than 
is commonly believed. Anne Moore, ‘ the fasting woman of 
Tutbury,’ though an impostor, and finally detected, lived foi 
nine days and nine nights without food. 
“ACCIDENTS (Cautions to Prevent). 1. As most 
sudden deaths come by water, particular caution is therefore 
necessary in its vicinity. 
“ 2. Stand not near a tree, or any leaden spout, iron gate, 
or palisade, in time of lightning. 
“ 3. Lay loaded guns in safe places, and never imitate 
firing a gun in jest. 
“4. Never sleep near charcoal; if drowsy at any work 
where charcoal fires are used, go out into the fresh air. 
« 5. Carefully rope trees before they are cut down, that 
when they fall they may do no injury. 
“ 6. When benumbed with cold beware of sleeping out of 
doors; rub yourself, if you have it in your power, with snow, 
and do not hastily approach the fire. 
“ 7. Beware of damps. 
“8. Admit air into vaults by letting them remain open 
! some time before you enter, and scatter powdered lime in 
i them. Where a lighted candle will not burn, animal life 
cannot exist; it will be an excellent caution, therefore, before 
entering damp and confined places—as wells, privy vaults, 
cellars, &c.—to try this simple experiment. 
“ 9. Never leave by themselves saddle or draught horses 
while in use, nor go immediately behind a led horse, as he is 
apt to kick. 
“ 10. Ride not on footways. 
“ 11. Be wary of children, whether they are up or in bed; 
and particularly when they are near the fire, an element 
with which they are very apt to amuse themselves. 
“ 12. Leave nothing poisonous open or accessible, and 
never omit to write the word Poison in large letters upon it 
wherever it may be placed. 
« 13. Whenever you feel very uneasy tell your distress 
early to a steady friend.” 
SMALL DRONES. 
If my memory serves me I think Keys in his book makes 
mention of small drones, and, as far as I remember, he 
does not consider them a lusus natures , but assigns them 
i a position and office in every properly constituted hive. 
There must, however, be some mistake here, as most un¬ 
questionably they are not seen in every hive, and are but 
seldom seen in any. 
A small drone is, in truth, a rara apis , and may be considered 
as holding a somewhat analogous relation to the bee common¬ 
wealth which dwarfs and pigmies hold to ours. I have seen 
them twice and handled one once. The first occasion was 
on the 28th of May, 1846; the last on the 10th of June, 
1857. On both occasions they were the forerunners of their 
sex. He of the first date had it all to himself for fully a 
week, and no doubt considered himself no small fly, being 
the one and only lord of that bee creation. The other had 
not time given him thus to plume himself on his singular 
dignity, as the day after his appearance others of the 
approved shape and size sported dronefully about, so se- 
I riously offending his pigmy ship, that I suppose he straight¬ 
way put an end to his brief existence, as he was no longer 
| seen or heard. 
I am prevented from adopting the suggestion of “An 
Old Apiarian,” page 221, that they might be reared in 
old contracted combs, from the fact that neither of the 
hives in which they appeared was one year old. “ A dark- 
coloured common bee may be mistaken for a small drone;” 
but a small drone, when seen, cannot so be mistaken. From 
their peculiar formation they would strike the careless 
observer as being larger and thicker than the working bee ; 
but in reality they are not so, as a worker's cell can contain 
them. This bulky appearance may be thus accounted for: 
they do not taper at their lower extremity, as do the workers; 
their head is rounder, and their wings appear broader. Upon 
a more close examination of them the last ring of the 
abdomen is found fringed with hairs, and the distinctive 
marks of the sex are proportionably developed. 
The startling theory of “ An Old Apiarian ” on the 
sameness of the queen’s eggs—startling as well for its 
novelty as for the able and plausible manner he enunciates 
it—I for one cannot adopt. The cases of the “bird” and 
“ female” are scarcely, I think, analogous. We have it on 
the authority of Dr. Bevan that worker bees have been 
known to destroy drone eggs which the queen by mistake 
had deposited in worker cells; and there is no case on 
record of the workers being ever known to make a queen out 
of a male egg. The malformation of an unimpregnated 
queen does not unfit her for depositing eggs in worker cells, 
as she has been often seen to do so. It signifies nothing 
that she cannot reach the bottom of the cell, for it may be 
frequently seen that even impregnated queens so deposit 
their eggs, which misplacement is remedied by the bees, 
not by removing the egg to the bottom, but by elongating 
the cell. 
Differing from “ An Old Apiarian ” on this point, I cor¬ 
dially agree with him in believing that the nutriment 
administered to a grub destined for royalty has something 
to do in the matter of that wonderful transformation. 
Huber assures us that there are such insects as fertile 
ivorkers; he caught one in the very act of laying. These 
are never found except in hives where artificial queens have 
been reared, and the only plausible solution of this phe¬ 
nomenon that I have ever seen is that given by Dr. Bevan, 
who says: “ Probably the fertility of these workers is occa¬ 
sioned by some royal jelly being casually dropped into their 
cell when grubs, as they invariably issue from cells ad¬ 
joining those inhabited by grubs that have been raised from 
the plebeian to the royal rank.” It is a remarkable fact that 
these fertile workers never lay any but drone eggs.—D. G. 
M‘Lellan, JRutherglen . 
ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY’S MEETING. 
The July Meeting of the Entomological Society was j 
held on the 6th inst., the chair being occupied by W. W. | 
Saunders, Esq., F.R.S., President of the Society. After the ! 
confirmation of the minutes and the announcement of i 
donations to the library received since the last Meeting 
Mr. Samuel Stevens exhibited a box of beautiful insects 
received from Mr. Plant, captured to the north of Natal, in j 
South Africa, containing many new species, as well as j 
specimens of the remarkable Moluris Barthelemyi, supposed j 
not to have been previously possessed by any English j 
cabinet. Mr. Westwood stated, however, that there were 
specimens in the Hopeian collection at Oxford. 
Mr. Stevens also exhibited a living specimen of the rare ' 
Gnorimus variabilis, which he had reared from the larva 
state, which had lasted not less than three years, the insect j 
feeding on oak wood. 
Mr. Douglas exhibited Stenolophus elegans, a rare species ! 
of Carabidse ; also the rare Trinodes hirtus , and the larva of j 
Tiresias serra, taken in the bark of trees at Richmond 
Park. 
Mr. Ianson exhibited a number of new and rare species 
of Beetles recently captured, including Lcemophlceus clema- 
tidis, found in the stems of the common Traveller’s Joy ; 
Plinthus caliginosus, taken near Dareuth; Pseudopsis sul- 
calus, of which only three English specimens had been pre¬ 
viously captured, and which was taken by Mr. Ianson in a 
Boletus growing on a Walnut tree in Headley Lane, Surrey; 
also Oryphaleus binodulus of Ratzeburg, and a new British 
species of Scolytus ( S. rugulosus of Ratzeburg), much 
