Royal Jelly (short story)

Albert and Mabel Taylor have a newborn baby daughter. Mabel is frightened because the child will not eat and has been losing weight since birth. Albert, a beekeeper, devises the novel solution of adding royal jelly, used to make bee larvae grow, to the baby's milk. The baby begins to drink ravenously, getting fatter.

Albert admits to putting royal jelly in their daughter's milk, and Mabel asks him to stop. He tries to soothe his wife by explaining its nutritional value as stated in several magazines. Despite his wife's continued objections, Albert continues to add royal jelly to his daughter's milk, resulting in her growing larger. Finally Albert admits that he himself ate royal jelly in an effort to increase his fertility, which obviously worked as their daughter was conceived soon after.

Mabel begins to realise how much her husband resembles a gigantic bee, and how their daughter looks like a large grub. At the end of the story, Albert says, "Why don't you cover her up, Mabel? We don't want our little queen to catch a cold."

• "Royal Jelly" title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database

This article about a horror short story (or stories) published in the 1950s is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by adding missing information.

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