Another problem still remains for solution. Why are the queens reared, according to M. Schirach's method, mute, whilst those bred in the time of swarming have the faculty of emitting a certain sound? What is the physical cause of this difference? At first I thought it might be ascribed to the period of life, when the worms that are to become queens receive the royal food. While hives swarm, the royal worms receive the food adapted for queens, from the moment of leaving the egg; those on the contrary, destined for queens, according to M. Schirach's method, receive it only the second or third day of their existence. It appears to me that this circumstance may have an influence on the different parts of organisation, and particularly on the organ of voice. Experiment has not confirmed this conjecture. I constructed glass cells in perfect imitation of royal cells, that the metamorphosis of the worms into nymphs, and of the nymphs to queens, might be visible. These experiments are related in a preceding letter. Into one of these artificial cells we introduced the nymph of a worm, reared according to M. Schirach's method, twenty-four hours before it could naturally undergo its last metamorphosis; and we replaced the glass cell in the hive, that the nymph might have the necessary degree of heat. Next day, we had the satisfaction of seeing it divest itself of the spoil, and assume its ultimate figure. This queen was prevented from escaping from her prison; but we had contrived an aperture for her thrusting out her trunk, and that the bees might feed her. I expected that she would have been completely mute; but it was otherwise; for she emitted sounds similar to those already described, therefore my conjecture was erroneous. I next conceived that the queen being restrained in her motions, and in her desire for liberty, was induced to emit certain sounds. All queens, in this new point of view, are equally capable of emitting the sound, but to induce them to it, they must be in a confined situation. In the natural state, the queens that come from workers are not a single instant in restraint; and, if they do not emit the sound, it is because nothing impels them to it. On the other hand, those produced at the time of swarming are induced to do so by the captivity in which they are kept. For my own part, I give little weight to this conjecture; and though I state it here, it is less with a view to claim merit than to put others on a plan of discovering something more probable.