Langstroth on the Hive and the Honey-Bee: A Bee Keeper's Manual. L. L. Langstroth

than that of the other bees. Her motions are usually slow and matronly, although she can, when she pleases, move with astonishing quickness.

      No colony can long exist without the presence of this all-important insect. She is just as necessary to its welfare, as the soul is to the body, for a colony without a queen must as certainly perish, as a body without the spirit hasten to inevitable decay.

      She is treated by the bees, as every mother ought to be, by her children, with the most unbounded respect and affection. A circle of her loving offspring constantly surround her, testifying, in various ways, their dutiful regard; offering her honey, from time to time, and always, most politely getting out of her way, to give her a clear path when she wishes to move over the combs. If she is taken from them, as soon as they have ascertained their loss, the whole colony is thrown into a state of the most intense agitation; all the labors of the hive are at once abandoned; the bees run wildly over the combs, and frequently, the whole of them rush forth from the hive, and exhibit all the appearance of anxious search for their beloved mother. Not being able anywhere to find her, they return to their desolate home, and by their mournful tones, reveal their deep sense of so deplorable a calamity. Their note, at such times, more especially when they first realize her loss, is of a peculiarly mournful character; it sounds something like a succession of wails on the minor key, and can no more be mistaken by the experienced bee-keeper, for their ordinary, happy hum, than the piteous moanings of a sick child can be confounded, by an anxious mother, with its joyous crowings, when overflowing with health and happiness.

      I am perfectly aware that all this will sound to many, much more like romance than sober reality; but I have determined, in writing this book, to state facts, however wonderful, just as they are; confident that they will, before long, be universally received, and hoping that the many wonders in the economy of the honey bee will not only excite a wider interest in its culture, but will lead those who observe them, to adore the wisdom of Him who gave them such admirable instincts. I cannot refrain from quoting here, the forcible remarks of an English clergyman, who appears to be a very great enthusiast in bee-culture.

      "Every bee-keeper, if he have only a soul to appreciate the works of God, and an intelligence of an inquisitive order, cannot fail to become deeply interested in observing the wonderful instincts, (instincts akin to reason,) of these admirable creatures; at the same time that he will learn many lessons of practical wisdom from their example. Having acquired a knowledge of their habits, not a bee will buzz in his ear, without recalling to him some of these lessons, and helping to make him a wiser and a better man. It is certain that in all my experience, I never yet met with a keeper of bees, who was not a respectable, well-conducted member of society, and a moral, if not a religious man.[1] It is evident, on reflection, that this pursuit, if well attended to, must occupy some considerable share of a man's time and thoughts. He must be often about his bees, which will help to counteract the baneful effect of the village inn. "Whoever is fond of his bees is fond of his home," is an axiom of irrefragable truth, and one which ought to kindle in every one's breast, a favorable regard for a pursuit which has the power to produce so happy an influence. The love of home is the companion of many other virtues, which, if not yet developed into actual exercise, are still only dormant, and may be roused into wakeful energy at any moment."

      The fertility of the queen bee has been much under-estimated by most writers. It is truly astonishing. During the height of the breeding season, she will often, under favorable circumstances, lay from two to three thousand eggs, a day! In my observing hives, I have seen her lay, at the rate of six eggs a minute! The fecundity of the female of the white ant, is much greater than this, as she will lay as many as sixty eggs a minute! but then her eggs are simply extruded from her body, to be carried by the workers into suitable nurseries, while the queen bee herself deposits her eggs in their appropriate cells.

On the way in which the eggs of the Queen Bee are fecundated.

       Table of Contents

      I come now to a subject of great practical importance, and one which, until quite recently, has been attended with apparently insuperable difficulties.

      It has been noticed that the queen bee commences laying in the latter part of winter, or early in spring, and long before there are any drones or males in the hive. (See remarks on Drones.) In what way are these eggs impregnated? Huber, by a long course of the most indefatigable observations, threw much light upon this subject. Before stating his discoveries, I must pay my humble tribute of gratitude and admiration, to this wonderful man. It is mortifying to every scientific naturalist, and I might add, to every honest man acquainted with the facts, to hear such a man as Huber abused by the veriest quacks and imposters; while others who have appropriated from his labors, nearly all that is of any value in their works, to use the words of Pope,

      "Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer,

       And without sneering, teach the rest to sneer."

      Huber, in early manhood, lost the use of his eyes. His opponents imagine that in stating this fact, they have thrown merited discredit on all his pretended discoveries. But to make their case still stronger, they delight to assert that he saw every thing through the medium of his servant Francis Burnens, an ignorant peasant. Now this ignorant peasant was a man of strong native intellect, possessing that indefatigable energy and enthusiasm which are so indispensable to make a good observer. He was a noble specimen of a self-made man, and afterwards rose to be the chief magistrate in the village where he resided. Huber has paid the most admirable tribute to his intelligence, fidelity and indomitable patience, energy and skill.

      It would be difficult to find, in any language, a better specimen of the true Baconian or inductive system of reasoning, than Huber's work upon bees, and it might be studied as a model of the only true way of investigating nature, so as to arrive at reliable results.

      Huber was assisted in his investigations, not only by Burnens, but by his own wife, to whom he was engaged before the loss of his sight, and who nobly persisted in marrying him, notwithstanding his misfortune, and the strenuous dissuasions of her friends. They lived for more than the ordinary term of human life, in the enjoyment of uninterrupted domestic happiness, and the amiable naturalist scarcely felt, in her assiduous attentions, the loss of his sight.

      Milton is believed by many, to have been a better poet, for his blindness; and it is highly probable that Huber was a better Apiarian, for the same cause. His active and yet reflective mind demanded constant employment; and he found in the study of the habits of the honey bee, full scope for all his powers. All the facts observed, and experiments tried by his faithful assistants, were daily reported to him, and many inquiries were stated and suggestions made by him, which would probably have escaped his notice, if he had possessed the use of his eyes.

      Few have such a command of both time and money as to enable them to carry on, for a series of years, on a grand scale, the most costly experiments. Apiarians owe more to Huber than to any other person. I have repeatedly verified the most important of his observations, and I take the greatest delight in acknowledging my obligations to him, and in holding him up to my countrymen, as the Prince of Apiarians.

      My Readers will pardon this digression. It would have been morally impossible for me to write a work on bees, without saying at least as much as this, in vindication of Huber.

      I return to his discoveries on the impregnation of the Queen Bee. By a long course of experiments most carefully conducted, he ascertained that like many other insects, she is fecundated in the open air, and on the wing, and that the influence of this lasts for several years, and probably for life. He could not form any satisfactory conjecture, as to the way in which the eggs which were not yet developed in her ovaries, could be fertilized. Years ago, the celebrated Dr. John Hunter, and others, supposed that there must be a permanent receptacle for the male sperm, opening into the passage for the eggs called the oviduct. Dzierzon, who must be regarded as one of the ablest contributors of modern times, to Apiarian science, maintains this opinion, and states that he has found such a receptacle filled with a