Curiosities & wonders > New observations on the natural history of bees

COMBATS OF QUEENS. 101
enter; the virgin queen then disengaged
herself and fled; and she also succeeded in
escaping another attack, where her adver¬
sary had the advantage of position. These
rivals appeared nearly of equal strength;
and it was difficult to foresee to which side
victory would incline, until at last, by a suc¬
cessful exertion, the virgin queen mortally
wounded the stranger, and she expired in a
moment. The sting had penetrated so far
that the victor was unable to retradt it, and
she was overthrown by the fall of her ene¬
my. She made great exertions to disen¬
gage the sting: but could succeed by no
other means than turning on the extremi¬
ty of her belly, as on a pivot. Probably its
barbs fell by this motion, and, closing spi¬
rally around the stem, came more easily
from the wound.
These observations, Sir, I think will Satis¬
fy you respecting the conjecture of our ce¬
lebrated Reaumur. It is certain that if
several queens are introduced into a hive,
one alone will preserve the empire; that the
others will perish from her attacks; and that
the workers at no time will attempt to em¬
ploy their stings against a stranger queen.
I can conceive what has. misled Riem and