ORDER VI.—VEIN-WINGED INSECTS. O77 
the hive with bee-bread, are caught with a bird-lime twig, 
and examined with a powerful magnifying glass, this farina, 
which they carry in their fossz, shows no difference from its 
former condition, when on the stamen. [If it is held, in a 
spoon, over the fire, it will not melt as wax does, but, on 
the contrary, will burn to ashes. 
It was at one time believed that the pollen, mixed with 
the honey, or the venom of bees, would produce wax; but 
all the experiments made in this manner, or for this pur- 
pose, proved a failure. The pollen must, therefore, undergo 
a chemical change within the body of the bee before it can 
become wax; and, in order to make the latter from the for- 
mer, it is necessary that the bees swallow the pollen, when 
it is manufactured into wax within their stomachs. Ac- 
cording to Reaumure, it is then disgorged by the mouth as 
wax ; but, according to the observations of Huber and other 
apiarians, the wax comes out in little scales from the abdo- 
men, between the ringlets. This latter opinion is consid- 
ered the correct one, and is now well established by observa- 
tion and experience ; so that the questions, whether the wax 
is made out of honey or out of the pollen, and whether the 
wax is disgorged from the mouth or detached from between 
the ringlets of the hind body in the form of little scales, seem 
to be now entirely settled among the most learned entomol- 
ogists and apiarians. 
The third article which the bees collect is honey, with 
which they fill the cells. We have already mentioned that 
this substance is obtained from the bottom of the calyx, or 
from the nectaries of flowers. Honey, with the farina, 
forms the principal food of bees—the former especially, 
when the weather is unfavorable for their excursions out 
of the hive, and during winter, when they perish unless 
they have a sufficient quantity of this food in the hive. 
The perfume, which is more or less contained in both 
the wax and honey, is derived from the pollen of aromatic 
