One cannot suppose that the queen in coming to a drone cell deliberately withholds the male germ as the egg passes down her oviduct; some inhibitory factor preventing the release of the sperm-cell must be brought into play which as yet we have not discovered. This production of males from unfertilized eggs, or “parthenogenesis” as it is called, is a common feature among the hymenoptera, and some other groups of insects, and it occurs also among other lowly creatures to be described later. Having regard to the importance of the workers, a brief summary of their life-history must be given. These, it has already been indicated, are all, at any rate till three days old, potential queens. Their development into, or degradation to, the lower grade is determined, apparently, solely by the quality of the food, for the fact that queens are reared only in specially constructed cells of large size with walls of pollen instead of wax is explained by the larger size of the queen and the need for a more porous, air-permeated cell-wall on account of the longer time which must be spent in confinement. The worker is certainly the most “intellectual” member of the hive, but this superiority has been gained at a great price. Emerging from the chrysalis skin at about three weeks from the time that the egg from which she emerged was laid, she begins forthwith to gnaw her way through the mass of wax and pollen which forms the door of her prison. Rather, she eats her way through, for the material removed is swallowed as it is detached, thus the young bee, as Mr. Tickner Edwardes remarks, is caused to effect her own release by the promptings of her appetite. Hunger-strikes in the bee community are unknown. Speedily the youngster steps out, distinguishable from her elder sisters only by her weak, grey-hued, flaccid appearance. Her first act on gaining freedom is to groom herself down, after which she proceeds to explore the gloomy, busy, crowded thoroughfares of the hive. A day or two is thus passed in gathering strength. On the second appetite returns, and she proceeds to help herself from the vats of honey and pollen bins scattered here and there among the cradles of her sisters yet prisoners. But speedily she is caught and thrust, so to speak, on to the treadmill of work which is to know no cessation during her short span of life-some six or seven weeks. Her first duties are those of nursemaid. Without instruction, or previous experience, she begins to feed her younger sisters and brothers yet in the larval stage. But besides, during her first fortnight, before she is allowed to leave the hive she and her sisters of the same age have to fulfil a variety of tasks. All the indoor work of the house falls on these Cinderellas. Not only do they, and they alone, feed the young, but they have to produce the wax and build the combs and attend to the sanitary arrangements: “they are the brewers of the honey and the keepers of the stores; they feed the queen