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Former received opinions, requires, previous to its appearance, every fanction the various experiments, fuccefsfully repeated, can poffibly give it. The refults of thofe experiments, made all in glafs-hives, which carry with them an entire evidence, afford fufficient reafons to affert, that bees belong to that clafs of animals among which, although they have fexes, a true copulation cannot be proved; and that their ova, like the fpawn of fishes, most probably owe their fecundation to an impregnation from the males, as will appear in the fequel of this

narrative.

"I am not a little pleased to find that the celebrated Maraldi had fuch a notion, and I lament his neglecting to confirm it. He fays, in his Obfervations upon Bees, in the Hiftory of the Academy of Sciences for the year 1712, p. 332: Nous n'avons pu découvrir jusqu'à present de quelle maniere fe fait cette fecondation, fi c'eft dans le corps de la femelle, ou bien fi c'eft à la maniere des poiffons, après que la femelle a pofe jes oeufs: la matiere blanchâtre dont l'auf eft environné au fond de l'alvéole peu de temps après fa naissance, femble conforme à la derniere opinion, auffi-bien que les remarques faites plufieurs fois d'un grand nombre d'œufs qui font reftés infeconds au fond de l'alvéole autour defquels nous n'avons point vu cette matiere. "We never yet were able to difcover in what manner "this fecundation is performed; whether it is in the body of the fe"male, or whether it is after the manner of tifhes, after the female or "queen-bee has depofited her eggs: that liquid whitish substance, "with which each egg is furrounded at the bottom of the cell a little "while after its being laid, feemingly establishing this laft opinion, as "well as the frequent remarks made of a great number of eggs re66 maining barren in the cell, round which we could not fee the above. " mentioned whitish fubftance."

"This ingenious naturalift, by a nice examination of the structure of the drones, had, as well as Swammerdam, difcovered fome refemblances to the male organs of generation; and from thence conjectured, they were the males of the bee-infect; but he owns, with the rest, that he never could difcover them in the act of copulation.

"Having ftood the trials of fo many prying eyes in every age, the bees, as has been obferved by an ingenious author, had gained the character of an inviolable chastity, till Reaumur blafted their reputa tion. He makes the queen no better than a Meffalina *; though he could fee no more than what would raise a mere jealoufy or generate fufpicions.

"In order to be the better understood in the relation of my own experiments on the fecundation of bees, I here premise the outlines of the opinions adopted by the above-mentioned naturalifts on that head. They affert that the queen is the only female in the hive, and the mother of the next generation; that the drones are the males by which she is fecundated; and that the working bees, or bees that collect wax on the flowers, that knead it and form from it the combs ar cells which they afterwards fill with honey, are of neither fex.

But of late Mr. Schirach, a German naturalist, has given us a very different view of the claffes that conftitute the republic of bees, in an ingenious publication in his own language, under the title of The * Vid. JUVENAL, Sat. vi. ver. 128,

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Natural Hiftory of the Queen of the Bees, which has been fince tranf lated into French; from which I beg leave to relate the author's doce trine with regard to the working-bees only; the quality and functions of the drones being points which do not appear to be yet fettled by Mr Schirach himfelt. He aflirms, that all the common bees are females in difguife, in which the organs that diftinguish the fex, and particularly the ovaria, are obliterated, or at least, through their exceffive minuteneis, have not yet been obferved: that every one of thofe bees in the earlier period of its existence is capable of becoming a queen-bee, if the whole community fhould think proper to nurse it in a particular manner, and raife it to that rank. In short, that the queenbee lays only two kinds of eggs; viz. thofe that are to produce the drones, and thofe from which the working-bees are to proceed.

"The trials made by Mr. Schirach feem to evince the truth of his conclufions in the most fatisfactory manner, fingular as they appear to be at firft fight; and indeed in my own judgement, from the conftant happy refult of my numerous experiments, which I began near two years before Mr. Schirach's publication, and repeated every feafon fince, I am enabled to pronounce on their reality.

Chance, I own, befriended me in that difcovery, whilst I was mok anxioufly endeavouring to afcertain the ufe of drones. It was in the fpring of the year 1770, that I for the first time discovered what Maraldi had only conjectured, I mean the impregnation of the eggs by the males, and that I was made acquainted with the difference of fize in the drones or males obferved by Maraldi in his Obfervations upon Bees, inferted in the Hiftory of the Royal Academy of Sciences for the year 1712, p. 333. in these words:

"Nous avons trouvé depuis peu une grande quantité de bourdons, beaucoup plus petits que ceux que nous avions remarqué auparavant, et qui ne furpaffent point la grandeur des petites abeilles; de forte qu'il n'auroit pas été aife de les diftinguer dans cette ruche des abeilles ordinaires, fans le grand nombre que nous y en avons trouvé. Il fe pourroit bien faire que dans les ruches où l'on n'a pas trouvé de gros bourdons, il y en eût de ces petits, et qu'ils y aient été confondus avec le refle des abeilles, lorfque nous ne favions pas encore qu'il y en eût de cette taille. "We have of late found a great "quantity of drones much fmaller than those we had formerly obferved, and which do not exceed in fize the common bees; to that "it would not have been eafy to diftinguish them in that hive from "the common bees, had not the quantity of them been very confider "able. It might certainly have happened that in those hives, where have not been able to difcover large drones, there were a great number of thofe little ones, which may have been intermixed among "common bees when we were yet ignorant that any fuch finall drones "were exifting."

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"Reaumur himself, p. 591. of his Natural History of Infects, fays, "We have likewife found drones that were no bigger than the com? mon bees."

"They have notwithstanding escaped the obfervation of Mr. Schirach, and of his friend Mr. Hattorf member of an Academy in Lufatia, who, in a memoir he prefented in the year 1769, annihilates entirely the ufe of drones in a hive; and advances this fingular opinion, that

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the queen-bee of a hive lays eggs which produce young ones, without having any communication with the drones. For what purpose should wife nature then have furnished the drones with that large quantity of feminal liquor? To what ufe fo large an apparatus of fecundating organs, fo well defcribed by Reaumur and Maraldi?

*

"But I beg leave to remark, that thofe gentlemen seem to have drawn too hafty conclufions from their experiments, in rejecting the drones as bearing no fhare in the propagation of those infects. Their obfervations, that hives are peopled at a time of the year when there are no drones in being, is no ways conclufive; as it is evident, that they had seen none but drones of a large fize, their filence on the difference in the fize of them juftifying my remark. But to refume the narrative of my experiments: I had watched my glass-hives with indefatigable attention from the moment the bees, among which I had taken care to leave a large number of drones, were put into them, to the time of the queen laying her eggs, which generally happens the fourth or fifth day. I obferved the first or fecond day (always before the third) from the time the eggs are placed in the cells, that a great number of bees, fastening themselves to one another, hung down in the form of a curtain from the top to the bottom of the hive, in a fimilar manner they had done before at the time the queen depofited her eggs; an operation which (if we may conjecture at the inftincts of infects) feems contrived to hide what is tranfacting: be that as it will, it anfwered the purpofe of informing me that fomething was going forward. In fact, I prefently after perceived feveral bees, the fize of which through this thick veil (if I may fo exprefs myself) I could not rightly diftinguish, inferting the pofterior part of their bodies each into a cell, and finking into it, where they continued but a little while. After they had retired, I faw plainly with the naked eye a fmall quantity of a whitish liquor left in the angle of the bafis of each cell, containing an egg: it was lefs liquid than honey, and had no fweet taste at all. Within a day after, 1 found this liquor abforbed into the embryo, which on the fourth day is converted into a final worm, to which the working-bees bring a little honey for nourishment, during the first eight or ten days after its birth. After that time they ceafe to feed them; for they fhut up the cells, where thefe embryos continue inclofed for ten days more, during which time they undergo various changes too tedious here to defcribe."

Art. 4. Contains an account of a Portrait of Copernicus, prefented to the Royal Society by Dr. Wolf of Dantzick.

"The history of this portrait is as follows. It was formerly in the collection of Saxe Gotha, where it was always confidered as an origipal, which is even faid to appear from the archives of that court, and is the more probable, as the prince-bishop of Warmia, who obtained it from the late duke of Saxe Gotha, was too good a connoiffeur and too cautious to be deceived in this refpect. That bishop being at Gotha in the year 1735, obferved this portrait in the gallery of that palace; the proofs that were produced of its authenticity made him very defirous to

Glass-hives were used in preference to boxes, for a purpose too obvious 30 need explaining.

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acquire it. He at length obtained it by a kind of theft which it was neceffary to commit on the cathedral of Warmia, in which there was a very old portrait of one of the ancestors of the dukes of Saxe Gotha, who had been bishop of that fee, and whofe picture was wanting in the duke's collection of the portraits of his family, An exchange was accordingly made of the two originals, and the bifhop has fince bequeathed that of Copernicus to his favourite Mr. Hullarzewski."

Art. 5. Is the relation of a journey into Africa, from the Cape of Good Hope; by Dr. Andreas Sparrman of Stockholm: from which we fhall felect an account of a curious bird; whofe inftinct leads it to the detection of the wild-bee hives, whofe honey, however, it is of itself incapable to plunder.

The History of the HONEY-GUIDE, or CUCULUS

INDICATOR.

"This curious fpecies of Cuckow is found at a confiderable distance from the Cape of Good Hope, in the interior parts of Africa, being entirely unknown at that fettlement. The firft place where I heard of it was in a wood, called the Groot Vaader's Bosch, the Grand Father's Wood, fituated in a defart near the river which the Hottentots call T'kaut'kai. The Dutch fettlers thereabouts have given this bird the name of Honig-wyzer, or Honey-guide, from its quality of discovering wild-honey to travellers. Its colour has nothing friking or beautiful, as will appear from the defcription and drawing annexed; and its fize is confiderably fmaller than that of our Cuckow in Europe: but in return, the instinct which prompts it to feek its food in a fingular manner, is truly admirable. Not only the Dutch and Hottentots, but like wife a fpecies of quadruped, which the Dutch name a Ratel*, are fre quently conducted to wild bee-hives by this bird, which as it were pilots them to the very fpot. The honey being its favourite food, its own intereft prompts it to be inftrumental in robbing the hive, as some scraps are commonly left for its fupport. The morning and evening are its times of feeding, and it is then heard calling in a fhrill tone cherr, cherr, which the honey-hunters carefully attend to as the fummons to the chace. From time to time they anfwer with a foft whistle, which the bird hearing, always continues its note. As foon as they are in fight of each other, the bird gradually flutters towards the place where the hive is fituated, continually repeating its former call of cherr, cherr? nay, if it should happen to have gained a confiderable way before the men (who may eafily be hindered in the purfuit by bushes, rivers, and the like), it returns to them again, and redoubles its note, as if to reproach them with their inactivity. At last the bird is obferved to hover for a few moments over a certain spot, and then filently retiring to a neighbouring bush or other refting-place, the hunters are fure of finding the bees-neft in that identical spot, whether it be in a tree, or in the crevice of a rock, or (as is most commonly the cafe) in the earth. Whilst the hunters are bufy in taking the honey, the bird is feen looking on attentively to what is going forward, and waiting for its share of the fpoil. The bee-hunters never fail to leave a small portion for

Probably a new fpecies of badger.

their conductor, but commonly take care not to leave fo much as would fatisfy its hunger. The bird's appetite being only whetted by this partimony, it is obliged to commit a fecond treafon, by difcovering another bees-neft, in hopes of a better falary. It is further obferved, that the nearer the bird approaches the hidden hive, the more frequently it repeats its call, and feems more impatient.

I have had frequent opportunities of feeing this bird, and have been witnefs of the deftruction of feveral republics of bees, by means of its treachery. I had however but two opportunities of fhooting it, which I did to the great indignation of my Hottentots. From thofe fpecimens (both of which are fuppofed to be females) I have made the fabfequent defcription. The inhabitants in general accufe the fame bird of fometimes conducting its followers where wild beasts and venomous ferpents have their places of abode: this however I never had an opportunity of afcertaining myfelf; but am apt to believe fuch cafes to be accidental, when dangerous animals happen to be in the neighbourhood of a bees-neft.

"Whilst I ftaid in the interior parts of Africa, a neft was fhewn to me, which fome peafants affured me was the. neft of a Honey-guide. It was woven of flender filaments or fibres of bark, in the form of a bottle. The neck and opening hung downwards, and a string in au arched shape was fufpended across the opening, faftened by the two ends, perhaps for the bird to perch upon."

Art. 6. An Account of fome new Electrical Experiments. By Mr. Tiberius Cavallo.

Thefe experiments are curious, but not apparently impor tant, nor can they be well understood without the plates defcriptive of the Electrometer, with which they were made.

Art. 7. Contains a Third Effay on Sea-Anemonies. By ther Abbé Dicquemare.

The partitions, which divide the animal and the vegetable creation, are so very thin, according to the Abbé Dicquemare, that it remains a doubt with him, whether the concurrence of two fexes may not be difpenfed with in their propagation Convinced, at leaft, he declares himfelf to be, by his obfervations on the fea-anemonies, that "there certainly are ani-. mated beings which multiply, as it were, by flips."-He remarks, in particular, of one fpecies of the fea-anemonies, that' it affords a fingularity which is not obfervable in the fresh-' water polypi, that of multiplying by tearing off, of its own accord, fmall fhreds from its body. His experiments on thefe,

animals are curious.

"Towards the end of the year 1774," fays he, "I cut in two, in a perpendicular direction, an anemony of the firit fpecies, which had been formed from a moiety of one I had cut before, fo that each half: was then only a quarter of the primitive anemony. These two halves had the fame fate as the firit fections; and one of them, after having been thus reftored, and having been always kept by itfelf, produced, on the 1st of June 1775, a young anemony as perfect as those that are

produced

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