THE HANDY BOOK OF BEES. PART FIRST. AT certain times of the year, in every healthy hive of bees, there are a queen or mother bee; males, which are called drones; and working bees. There are also honey and wax, bee-bread and propolis. Her Shape and Appearance.-By looking at the representation of the different bees, the reader will see that a queen is less in size than a drone, and larger than a A working bee. In shape she is more like a worker than a drone, but more genteel and beautiful than either. Her abdomen or belly is comparatively very long, and gradually and gracefully tapers to a point-giving her an appearance quite distinguishable and different from all in the hive. She is really a queenly creature, and modest and graceful in all her movements. Mother and Monarch.-Being mother and monarch of the hive, her life is very precious. The loyalty of her people, and the activity and vigilance of her "body-guard," are most remarkable. No human monarch was ever half so well attended to by his subjects as a queen bee is by hers. The life and prosperity of a hive depend on the presence of a queen-a queen moving and reigning in the hive-or in prospect—that is, in embryo; for when a queen dies, or goes with a colony or swarm, she leaves behind her some princesses in their cells, or infant state; or eggs which the bees hatch into queens. If a hive lose its queen without expectation of getting another, all prosperity comes to an end- the contentment, loyalty, and industry of the bees depart from them: their stores of honey are often undefended and unprotected in such queenless hives, and stolen by the bees of prosperous ones. THE AGE OF QUEEN BEES. They live four years. In this fact the worth of their lives to the community is seen. The working bees live but nine months, and the drones are permitted neither to live nor to die; they are destroyed. The climax of their history is a chapter of horrors. But queens, generally speaking, live four years. A few die when they are three years old: scarcely one dies a natural death sooner, It is of great importance to a bee-keeper to know the age of his queens, but this point will be noticed again in another place. Queens are fourteen days in being hatched; that is, perfect queens are produced on the fourteenth day after eggs have been put into royal cells. The length of their days is not, to a thoughtful bee-keeper, so great a marvel as the shortness of time in which they are in their cradlecells. Only fourteen days for the process of developing small eggs into princesses of the blood? Yes, they are perfect in fourteen days. How long is a worker in the cell? Twenty-one days. And a drone? Twenty-four days. It is herein seen that queens are hatched in less time, by one half, than drones. The mystery of this is beyond our depth, but the fact indicates the value of the presence of the queens in their hives. When a queen is accidentally killed, or dies unexpectedly, or is taken from a hive, as in artificial swarming, the bees have the power to make another. They take an egg meant for a worker from a common cell, where, if unmolested and undisturbed, it would be developed into a worker in twenty-one days, and place it in a royal cell, and there convert it into a queen in fourteen days. In the royal cell the egg is developed into a different bee-different in size and colour, perfect every way, and perfect in seven days less time than it otherwise would have been if left in a common worker-cell. This is an exceedingly interesting point in bee-history, and a wise provision of nature. It is a fact established beyond dispute, that bees have the power of rearing queens from common eggs. How do they accomplish this work, and by what means? The power seems to be in a substance termed "royal jelly," which has a milky, gelatinous appearance. Whenever an egg is set in a royal cell, the bees place around it this milky-like substance, in which a little worm or grub is soon floating, and by which it is fed. What this "royal jelly" is, I do not know-neither can I tell where it comes from. It is understood that no writer has ventured to describe how or where it is manufactured or obtained. It has been said that this substance, which possesses so great and peculiar a power, is more pungent to the taste than that which is used in feeding the young of workers. We have never tasted either. If some analytical chemist would ever like to examine the two substances, with a view to discover the difference, we would gladly furnish him with a thimbleful of jelly in the swarming season-taking it, of course, from the cells in which it may be deposited. What takes place at the birth of queens will be explained when we come to the chapter on swarming, natural and artificial. IMPREGNATION OF QUEENS. This is a very important affair-so important that a beekeeper should know all he can about it; when and where it takes place, and what happens when it never takes place at all. Very well. Queens are mated or take the drone when they are very young-viz., from two to ten or twelve days old. If they are not mated before they are ten or twelve days old, they are worthless for breeding purposes, worthless for every purpose save that of keeping the bees together till they are worn out by labour or old age. When we consider the importance of impregnation, the number of drones is not to be wondered at, especially when we consider that copulation never takes place inside a hive. If the weather be unfavourable for ten days after their birth, queens are not mated. Some five-andtwenty years ago I caused a hive to rear a queen in the |