A coronation is the placing of the crown on a monarch's head with solemn rites and ceremonies. Part of the ceremony usually consists in the oath which the monarch takes, that he will govern justly, will always consult the real welfare of his people, and will conscientiously observe the fundamental laws of the state. In England kings and queens have been anointed and crowned in WestminsterAbbey, even to the latest times, with great splendour. The form of the coronation oath is that settled after the revolution of 1688. The Archbishop of Canterbury puts it to the sovereign, who swears to govern according to the statutes of parliament, to cause law and justice in mercy to be executed, and to maintain the Protestant religion. Research Coronation
The bee is a four winged stinging insect of the order Hymenoptera. Bees form the super-family Apoidea of the sub-order Apocrita.
The most important member of the family is the common hive or honey bee (Apis mellifica). It belongs to the warmer parts of the Eastern Hemisphere, but is now naturalized in the Western. A hive commonly consists of one mother or queen, from 600 to 800 males or drones, and from 15,000 to 20,000 working bees, formerly termed neuters, but now known to be imperfectly-developed females. The last-mentioned, the smallest, have twelve joints to their antennae, and six abdominal rings, and are provided with a sting; there is, on the outside of the hind-legs, a smooth hollow, edged with hairs, called the basket, in which the kneaded pollen or bee-bread, the food of the larvae, is stored for transit.
The queen has the same characteristics, but is of larger size, especially in the abdomen; she has also a sting. The males, or drones, differ from both the preceding by having thirteen joints to the antennae; a rounded head, with larger eyes, elongated and united at the summit; and no stings. According to Huber the working-bees are themselves divisible into two classes: one, the cirieres, devoted to the collection of provisions, etc; the other, smaller and more delicate, employed exclusively within the hive in rearing the young.
The mouth of the bee is adapted for both masticatory and suctorial purposes, the honey being conveyed thence to the anterior stomach or crop, communicating with a second stomach in which alone a digestive process can be traced. The queen, whose sole office is to propagate the species, has two large ovaries, consisting of a great number of small cavities, each containing sixteen or seventeen eggs. The inferior half-circles, except the first and last, on the abdomen of working-bees, have each on their inner surface two cavities, where the wax, secreted by the bee from its saccharine food, is formed in layers, and comes out from between the abdominal rings.
Respiration takes place by means of air-tubes which branch out to all parts of the body, the bee being exceedingly sensitive to an impure atmosphere. Of the organs of sense the most important are the antennae, deprivation of these resulting in a species of derangement. The majority of entomologists regard their function as in the first place auditory, but they are exceedingly ssensitive to tactual impressions, and are apparently the principal means of mutual communication.
Bees undergo perfect metamorphosis, the young appearing first as larvae, then changing to pupae, from which the imagosor perfect insects spring. Whether the offspring are to be female or male is said to be dependent upon the contact or absence of contact of the egg with the impregnating fluid received from the male and stored in a special sac communicating with the oviduct, unfertilized eggs producing males. The further question whether the offspring shall be queens or workers is resolved by the influence of environment upon function. The enlargement of a cell to the size of a royal chamber and the nourishment of its inmate with a special kind of food appear to be sufficient to transform an ordinary working-bee larva into a fully-developed female or queen-bee.
The season of fecundation occurs about the beginning of summer, and the laying begins immediately afterwards, and continues until autumn; in the spring as many as 12,000 eggs may be laid in twenty-four days. Those laid at the commencement of fine weather all belong to the working sort, and hatch at the end of four days. The larvae acquire their perfect state in about twelve days, and the cells are then immediately fitted up for the reception of new eggs. The eggs for producing males are laid two months later, and those for the females immediately afterwards. This succession of generations forms so many distinct communities, which, when increased beyond a certain degree, leave the parent hive to found a new colony elsewhere. Thus three or four swarms sometimes leave a hive in a season. A good swarm is said to weigh at least three kilograms. Besides the common bee (Apis mellifica) there are the Apis fasciata, domesticated in Egypt, the Apis Ugustica, or Ligurian bee of Italy and Greece, introduced into England, etc.
The humble-bees, or bumble-bees, of which about forty species are found in Britain and over sixty in North America, belong to the genus Bombus, which is almost worldwide in its distribution. Of these species solitary females which have survived the winter commence constructing small nests when the weather begins to be warm enough; some of them going deep into the earth in dry banks, others preferring heaps of stone or gravel, and others choosing always some bed of dry moss. In the nest the bee collects a mass of pollen and in this lays some eggs. The cells in these nests are not the work of the old bee, but are formed by the young insects similarly to the cocoons of silk-worms; and when the perfect insect is released from them by the old bee, which gnaws off their tops, they are employed as honey-cups.
The humble-bees, however, do not store honey for the winter, those which survive until the cold weather leaving the nest and penetrating the earth, or taking up some other sheltered position, and remaining there until the spring. The first brood consists of workers, and successive broods are produced during the summer. The experiment of domesticating different kinds of wild bees has been tried with no satisfactory results. Some bees, from their manner of nesting, are known as 'mason bees,' 'carpenter bees,' and 'upholsterer bees.' Some of these bees (genus Osmia) cement particles of sand or gravel together with a viscid substance in forming their nests; others make burrows in wood. The leaf-cutter or upholsterer bee (genus Megachile) lines its burrow with bits of leaf cut out in regular shapes. Research Bee
Formicoidea is the ant super-family of insects of the sub-order Apocrita, order Hymenoptera. Ants are small or medium sized, mostly yellow, brownish, brownish-black or black in colour and with angled antennae of up to fifteen segments. The petiole between the thorax and abdomen is either a knot-like single segment, or bearing a vertical scale, or two-segmented. Ants live communally, the nest being founded by the female who either finds her own site or penetrates a nest of some other ants - either of her own species or another. An antnest contains three castes: one or more queens; workers; and at certain periods winged males. The queen ant is originally winged, but after the mating flight sheds her wings. The workers are either all identical, or occur in several forms - large headed worker ants are popularly known as 'soldier ants'. Ants are omnivorous and often cultivate aphids for their secretions. Research Formicoidea
Lord Andrew Lloyd Webber is an English composer. He was born in 1948 at London. At an early age he learned to play various musical instruments at home and began composing. He continued his music studies at Westminster School, where his father was an organist. At the age of 9, he was able to play the organ and assisted his father during performances. In 1964 he went to Oxford University as a Queens Scholar of history, only to drop out a year later after meeting Tim Rice, and devoted his time to composing popular musicals and songs. He was knighted in 1992, and was created an honorary life peer in 1997 as Baron Lloyd-Webber, of Syndmonton in the County of Hampshire. Research Andrew Lloyd Webber
The most famous Cleopatra was Cleopatra VI, who was the last Queen of Egypt. According to Roman propaganda and legend she was born in 69 BC of Macedonian descent and became joint ruler with her brother, Ptolemy XIV in 52 BC. Exiled by her brother she retired to Syria and secured the aid of Julius Caesar. Ptolemy XIV was killed and Cleopatra was made Queen whereupon she returned to Rome with Caesar as his mistress.
On Caesar's death in 44 BC Cleopatra returned to Egypt and declared Caesarion, her son by Caesar, joint ruler. Mark Anthony now became her lover and put Caesarion to death. Cleopatra killed herself with the bite of an asp after failing to win favour with the new Roman Emperor Octavius and fearing capture.
It is far more likely that the Arabic accounts of Cleopatra are more accurate than the Roman, as Cleopatra was a political enemy of the Roman Empire. The Arabic accounts describe Cleopatra as an accomplished and effective ruler, scholar, alchemist, scientist and physician who effectively challenged Roman rule in the Eastern Mediterranean and who was the antipathy of Roman values.
Whether Cleopatra committed suicide or not is not known. The Roman propaganda, so popular with the Victorian British would have us believe so, but modern scholars researching Cleopatra consider it unlikely that Cleopatra would have killed herself. Research Cleopatra
John Doran was an English author and editor. He was born in 1807 at London of Irish parents and died in 1878. He began writing when a mere youth, and produced a great number of books, among them being Lives of the Queens of England of the House of Hanover, Monarchs retired from Business, History of Court Fools, the Princes of Wales, Their Majesties' Servants (a history of the English stage from Betterton to Kean), A Lady of the Last Century (Mrs. Montague), London in Jacobite Times. Research John Doran
Thomas Andrews was an Irish chemist. He was born in 1813 at Belfast and died in 1885. He studied chemistry at Glasgow under Thomas Thomson, and for a short time in Paris; then medicine at Belfast, Dublin, and Edinburgh, taking the degree of MD at the last place. After practising and teaching chemistry for ten years in Belfast, he was appointed vice-president of the Northern College there, which in 1849 was converted into Queen's College at which point he became president, and was professor of chemistry in Queens College from 1845 to 1879. He published important researches into the heat evolved and absorbed in chemical combinations, and in connection with the liquefaction of gases. Research Thomas Andrews
William Hepworth Dixon was an English writer. He was born in 1821 at Manchester and died in 1879. In 1849 he published a memoir of Howard the philanthropist, which was followed by the Life of WilliamPenn (1851), and by a work on Admiral Blake (1852). In 1853, after having been a contributor, he became chief editor of the Athenaeum, a post which he retained until 1869. During this period he published several very popular works, including the Personal History of LordBacon, The Holy Land, and New America, the last being followed by Spiritual Wives. After his retirement from the Athenaeum, and in the last ten years of his life, he gave to the world somewhere about twenty-five volumes of history, travel, and fiction, among others, Free Russia; Her Majesty's Tower; The Switzers; History of Two Queens, Catharine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn; Diana Lady Lyie, and Ruby Grey (both novels); and his last work, Royal Windsor. Research William Dixon
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