These particulars will give a just idea of the manner that bees receive a stranger queen; when they have time to forget their own, she is treated exactly as if she was their natural one, except that there is perhaps at first greater interest testified in her, or more conspicuous demonstrations of it. I am sensible of the impropriety of these expressions, but M. de Reaumur in some respect authorises them. He does not scruple to say, that bees pay _attention_, _homage_, and _respect_, to their queen, and from his example the like expressions have escaped most authors that treat on bees. Twenty-four or thirty hours absence is sufficient to make them forget their first queen, but I can hazard no conjecture on the cause. * * * * * Before terminating this letter, which is full of combats and disastrous scenes, I should, perhaps, give you an account of some more pleasing and interesting facts relative to their industry. However, to avoid returning to duels and massacres, I shall here subjoin my observations on the massacre of the males. You will remember, Sir, it is agreed by all observers, that at a certain period of the year, the workers kill and expel the drones. M. de Reaumur speaks of these executions as a horrible massacre. He does not expressly affirm, indeed, that he has himself witnessed it, but what we have seen corresponds so well with his account, that there can be no doubt he has beheld the peculiarities of the massacre. It is usually in the months of July and August, that the bees free themselves of the males. Then they are drove away and pursued to the inmost parts of the hive, where they collect in numbers; and as at the same time we find many dead drones on the ground before the hives, it is indubitable that after being expelled, the bees sting them to death. Yet on the surface of the comb, we do not see the sting used against them; there the bees are content to pursue and drive them away. You observe this, Sir, yourself, in the new notes added to _la Contemplation de la Nature_; and you seem disposed to think, that the drones forced to retire to the extremity of the hive, perish from hunger. Your conjecture was extremely probable. Still it was possible the carnage might take place in the bottom of the hive, and had been unobserved, because that part is dark, and escapes the observer's eye. To appreciate the justice of this suspicion, we thought of making the support of the hive of glass, and of placing ourselves below to see what passed in the scene of action. Therefore, a glass table was constructed, on which were put six hives with swarms of the same year; and, lying under it, we endeavoured to discover how the drones were destroyed. The invention succeeded to admiration. On the 4 of July, we saw the workers actually massacre the males, in the whole six swarms, at the same hour, and with the same peculiarities.