100 IXSECT ARCHITECTURE. 



they do not commence foundations for combs in several 

 places at once, but wait till an individual bee has selected 

 a site, and laid the foundation of a comb, which serves as 

 a directing mark for all that are to follow. Were we not 

 expressly told by so accurate an observer as Huber, we 

 might hesitate to believe that bees, though united in what 

 appears to be an harmonious monarchy, are strangers to 

 subordination, and subject to no discipline. Hence it is, 

 that though many bees work on the same comb*, they do 

 not appear to be guided by any simultaneous impulse. 

 The stimulus which moves them is successive. An indi- 

 vidual bee commences each operation, and several others 

 successively apply themselves to accomplish the same 

 purpose. Each bee appears, therefore, to act individually, 

 either as directed by the bees preceding it, or by the state 

 of advancement in which it finds the work it has to proceed 

 with. If there be anything like unanimous consent, it is 

 the inaction of several thousand workers while a single 

 individual proceeds to determine and lay down the foun- 

 dation of the first comb. Reaumur regrets, that, though he 

 could b}^ snatches detect a bee at work in founding cells or 

 perfecting their structure, his observations were generally 

 interrupted by the crowding of other bees between him 

 and the little builder. He was therefore compelled rather 

 to infer the different steps of their procedure from an ex- 

 amination of the cells when completed, than from actual 

 observation. The ingenuity of Huber, even under all the 

 disadvantages of blindness, succeeded in tracing the 

 minutest operations of the workers from the first waxen 

 plate of the foundation. We think the narrative of the 

 discoverer's experiments, as given b}^ himself, will be more 

 interesting than any abstract of it which we could fur- 

 nish : — 



" Having taken a large bell-shaped glass receiver, we 

 glued thin wooden slips to the arch at certain intervals, 

 because the glass itself was too smooth to admit of the 

 bees supporting themselves on it. A swarm, consisting 

 of some thousand workers, several hundred males, and a 

 fertile queen, was introduced, and they soon ascended to 



