8S IXSECT ARCHITECTURE. 



"a late swarm last summer, which, in consequence of the 

 drought, filled only one box with honey. As it was late in 

 the season, and the food collected* would not enable the 

 bees to subsist for the winter, I shut up the hive, and gave 

 them half-a-pint of honey every day. They immediately 

 set to work, filled the empty cells, and then constructed 

 new cells enough to fill another box, in which they de- 

 posited the remainder of the honey." 



A more interesting proof is thus related by the same 

 gentleman. "In the summer of 1824, I traced some wild 

 bees, w^hich had been feeding on the flowers in my meadow, 

 to their home in the woods, and which I found in the body 

 of an oak-tree, exactly fifty feet above the ground. Having 

 caused the entrance to the hive to be closed by an expert 

 climber, the limbs were separated in detail, until the trunk 

 alone was left standing. To the upper extremity of this, 

 a tackle-fall was attached so as to connect it with an 

 adjacent tree, and, a saw being applied below, the naked 

 trunk was cut through. AMien the immense weight was 

 lowered nearly to the earth, the ropes broke, and the mass 

 fell with a violent crash. The part of the tree which con- 

 tained the hive, separated b}^ the saw% was conveyed to my 

 garden, and placed in a vertical j^osition. On being re- 

 leased, the bees issued out by thousands, and though 

 alarmed, soon became reconciled to the change of situation. 

 By removing a part of the top of the block the interior of 

 the hive was exposed to view, and the comb itself, nearly six 

 feet in height, was observed to have fallen down two feet 

 below the roof of the cavity. To repair the damage \vas 

 the first object of the labourers : in doing which, a large 

 part of their store of honey was expended, because it was 

 at too late a season to obtain materials from abroad. In 

 the following February these industrious but unfortunate 

 insects issuing in a confused manner from the hive, fell 

 dead in thousands aroimd its entrance, the victims of a 

 poverty created by their efforts to repair the ruins of their 

 habitation."* 



In another experiment, M. Iluber confined a swarm so 

 * American Quarterly Review for June, 1828, p. 382. 



