MATERIAL OF WAX. 203 



idea of Shakspeare, when he makes his Titania, commanding her 

 fairies, bid them 



" The honey-bags steal from the humble bees, 

 And for night tapers crop their waxen thighs." 



That Humble-bees, and all bees, were in the habit either of 

 collecting wax ready made from flowers, or of manufacturing 

 it from this flowery pollen (the lading of their thigh baskets) 

 was the generally received opinion; and even those close 

 observers, Eeaumer and Bonnet, seem to have thought much 

 the same ; whereas it is now well ascertained that honey, not 

 pollen, is the original material of wax, which indeed no Bee can 

 make without it. 



That the primary foundation of wax is not pollen was first 

 concluded, by the celebrated John Hunter, on account of its 

 varied colour ; whereas that of wax is uniform ; and moreover 

 pollen continues to be collected by the workers of those hives 

 wherein the comb is already complete. Huber and others 

 further found, on experiment, that bees fed entirely upon honey 

 and sugar, and deprived, at the same time, of all opportu- 

 nities of gathering pollen, were able without it to construct 

 combs, though utterly at a loss to feed their brood for lack of 

 the bee-bread derived from farina of flowers. Prom these and 

 other observations, it was proved beyond doubt, that honey or 

 sugar, not pollen, is essential to the formation of wax, a 

 secretion which, exuding from the rings of the bee's stomach, 

 is sometimes visible in the form of scales. 



Eelative to wax and its employ, Huber further discovered 



