On the third of May 1788, we divided eighteen hives into two portions; all the queens were about a year old. Thus each portion of the hives had but half the bees that were originally there. Eighteen halves wanted queens, but the other eighteen had very fertile ones. They soon began to lay the eggs of males; but, the bees being few, they did not construct royal cells, and none of the hives threw a swarm.--Therefore, if the hive containing the old queen is not very populous, she remains in it until the subsequent spring; and if the population is then sufficient, royal cells will be constructed: the queen will begin to lay male eggs, and, after depositing them, will issue forth at the head of a colony, before the young queens are produced. Such is a very brief abstract of my observations on swarms conducted by old queens. You must excuse the long detail on which I am about to enter, concerning the history of the royal cells left by the queen in the hive. Every thing relative to this part of the history of bees has hitherto been very obscure. A long course of observations, protracted even during several years, was necessary to remove, in some degree, the veil that concealed these mysteries. I have been indemnified for the trouble, indeed, by the pleasure of seeing my experiments reciprocally confirmed; but, considering the assiduity required in these researches, they were truly very laborious. Having established in 1788 and 1789, that queens a year old conducted the first swarm, and that they left worms or nymphs in the hive to transform into queens in their turn; I endeavoured, in 1790, to profit by the goodness of the spring, to study all that related to these young queens; and I shall now extract the chief experiments from my journal. On the fourteenth of May, we introduced two portions of bees, from the straw hives, into a large glass hive very flat; and allowed them only one queen of the preceding year, and which had already commenced laying in its native hive. We introduced her on the fifteenth. She was very fertile. The bees received her well, and she soon began to lay in large and small cells alternately. On the twentieth, we saw the formation of twelve royal cells, all on the edges of the communications, or passages through the combs, and shaped liked stalactites. On the twenty-seventh, ten were much but unequally enlarged; but none so long as when the worms are hatched.