The sole occupation of the Queen is to lay eggs in the various cella prepared by the workers for that purpose, for she takes no care of the young herself. Until she is about eleven mouths old, the eggs laid are nearly all such as will turn to workers, but at the completion of that period, which most frequently happens in the spring time, the queen commences the great laying of the eggs of males ; at this time the queen will lay from 20(10 to 3000 eggs, sometimes from 40 to 50 a day being laid during the months of March and April. Thereis also another laying of the eggs of males in the autumn, but this is not so considerable. In the interval, the eggs of workers are almost exclu sively laid.
There seems to be a relation between the laying of the eggs of males and the construction of royal cells, for the workers always commence the construction of the latter at the time that the female is laying the eggs that are to turn to drones.
The royal cells are very different from those of the male or worker, and aro generally suspended from the edges or sides of the comb : their number varies from two or three to twenty, though the latter is a very un usual number. In form they are very much like a pear, having the thickest end joined to the comb, the other end, at which part the mouth or entrance of the cell is situated, hanging downwards.
In these cells the queen deposits the eggs of future queens, at intervals of at least a day, and always during the period of laying the eggs of males When the Queen is about to lay, she thrusts her head into a eel to ascertain its fitness ; she then inserts her abdomen, and in a fey seconds withdraws it, leaving an egg at the bottom of the cell fixer in an upright position by a glutinous substance at one of its ends.
The egg is about one-twelfth of an inch long, and of a cylindrica form, with rounded ends. When the larva emerges from the egg, it i, immediately supplied with food by the nurse-bees. This larva may b( seen lying in a curved position at the bottom of the cell, where it con tinues to grow until it has completely filled up the space ; when it is full grown it lies horizontally with its head towards the entrance The food given to the larva is a mixture of farina, honey, and water which is converted into a whitish jelly by elaboration in the stomach of the nurse-bees : the proportions of farina and honey vary accordint to the age of the young, and we believe that the food is not giver iirectly to the larva, but disgorged into the cell, so that the insect is miromided with it. But when the larva is nearly full grown, its food
s sweeter (probably containing a greater proportion of honey), and s applied by the nurse-bees directly to its mouth, somewhat in the nanner of a bird feeding its young.
The drone and worker-bees are of a grayish colour when they first leave their cells, and several days elapse before they are strong enough to fly; but the queen is kept prisoner iu her cell for some time after she has assumed the imago state. The reasons for this imprisonment we shall presently show.
When the larva in the queens' cells are about to change into pupa the old queen begins to exhibit signs of agitation—running carelessly over the cells, occasionally thrusting her abdomen into some of them as if about to lay, but withdrawing without having done so, or perhaps laying them on the side of the cell instead of at the bottom. She is no longer surrounded by her usual circle of attendants, and her agitation being communicated to all she passes, at length a general confusion is created, till at last the greater portion of the bees rush out of the hive with that queen at their head. It is thus that the first swarm quits the hive, and it is invariably conducted by the old queen.
At any other time the queen would have been unable to fly, the great number of eggs contained in her abdomen rendering her too heavy ; this however is sufficiently reduced after the great laying just described to enable her to fly with ease.
An unerring instinct obliges the Queen to leave the hive at this time, for two sovereigns never can co-exist in the same community ; and had she not left it the young queens (now just about to quit their cells) would inevitably have been killed by her. Let us now observe what is going on in the hive which has just been deserted by its queen. It would seem as if it were too much reduced by the departure of the swami, but it must be borne in mind that this event never occurs except iu the middle of the day and during very fine sunny weather, when a large portion of the bees are abroad gathering honey and pollen ; and if the hive contain a numerous colony, these on their return, together with those which have not been disturbed during the general confusion, and a considerable number of young brood continually hatching, form a sufficient stock, and perhaps even enough to send off another swarm.