13 Riley — Presidential Address. 



epipharynx, and by alternately arching and depressing the 

 maxillte, the space enclosed is increased or decreased, thus pro- 

 ducing suction and drawing the liquid held on the tongue into 

 the opening of the esophagus. 



When drawn from the flowers the nectar is thin and watery 

 and lacks the qualities of the delicious honey into which we find 

 it converted when removed from the cells sealed by the bees. 

 This watery substance is evaporated to the proper consistency in 

 the heat of the hive and by currents of air passing over the sur- 

 face of the combs before the cells are sealed, these currents being 

 created by bees stationed at the entrance and buzzing incessantly. 

 There has been much discussion among apiarians, as among 

 writers, as to whether the bee gathers or makes honey. Strictly 

 speaking it does both. Formic acid is contained in the blood of 

 the bee and especially in the salivary glands, as recently demon- 

 strated by von Planta of Zurich, and when the gathered nectar, 

 which easily ferments, is regurgitated from the first stomach into 

 the cell, it is combined with sufficient formic acid to change the 

 cane sugar into invert sugar (dextrose and levulose in equal pro- 

 portions) while the evaporating process just described eliminates 

 the superflous water; so that honey which resists fermentation is 

 essentially a made product. 



I would also draw your attention to the wai-producing organs 

 (See Fig. 3a, a). If we examine the underside of the abdomen of 

 the worker, the exposed portion of each segment will be seen 

 to be covered with a web of hairs, and by elongating the abdomen, 

 each segment, with the exception of the first and sixth, is seen 

 to bear two shallow, irregularly-shaped plates, one on each side 

 of the median ridge, which is extended as a rim around the 

 whole contour. These pale yellow, smooth plates are in reality 

 w&x moulds, the wax glands being under the plates and the se- 

 creted wax reaching the surface by osmos through the thin mem- 

 brane and hardening into a somewhat brittle scale, resembling in 

 appearance a minute, nearly transparent fish scale. The wax is 

 secreted under conditions of great heat, the bee ascending for 

 this purpose to the top of the hive, and the wax producers con- 

 suming a large amount of honey. 



The next structure of importance to which I would call your 

 attention is the wax pincers (Fig. lb, a, b). which is a modified 

 structure of the juncture of the tibia and metatarsus of the pos- 



