HIVE-BEES. ' 123 



grow stronger the oftener they change inhabitants. Every 

 bee-grnb, before its metamorphosis into a nymph, fastens its 

 skin to the partitions of its cell, but in such a manner as to 

 make it correspond with the lines of the angle, and without 

 in the least disturbing the regularity of the figui-e. During 

 summer, accordingly, the same lodging may serve for three 

 or four grubs in succession ; and in the ensuing season it 

 may accommodate an equal number. Each grub never fails 

 to fortify the panels of its chamber by arraying them with 

 its spoils, and the contiguous cells receive a similar aug- 

 mentation from its brethren.* Eeaumur found as many as 

 seven or eight of these skins spread over one another : so 

 that all the cells being incrusted with six or seven cover- 

 ings, well dried and cemented with propolis, the whole 

 fabric daily acquires a new degree of solidity. 



It is obvious, however, that by a repetition of this pro- 

 cess the cell might be rendered too contracted ; but in such 

 a case the bees know well how to proceed, by turning the 

 cells to other uses, such as magazines for bee-bread and 

 honey. It has been remarked, however, that in the hive 

 of a new swarm, during the months of July and August, 

 there are fewer small bees or nurse-bees than in one that 

 has been tenanted four or five years. The workers, indeed, 

 clean out the cell the moment that a young bee leaves its 

 cocoon, but they never detach the silky film which it has 

 previously spun on the walls of its cell. But though honey 

 is deposited after the young leave the cells, the reverse also 

 happens ; and accordingly, when bees are bred in con- 

 tracted cells, they are by necessity smaller, and constitute, 

 in fact, the important class of nurse-bees. 



We are not disposed, however, to go quite so far as an 

 American periodical writer, who says, " Thus we see that 

 the contraction of the cell may diminish the size of a bee, 

 even to the extinction of life, just as the contraction of a Chinese 

 shoe reduces the foot even to uselessness." f We know, on 

 the contrary, that the queen bee will not deposit eggs in a 

 cell either too small or too large for the proper rearing of 



* Spectacle de la Nature, vol. i. 



t North American Eev. Oct. 1828, p. Srjo. 



