HABITATIONS OF INSECTS. 493 



eels of wax against the vault of the hive, disposing 

 them with the point of her mandibles in the direction 

 which she wishes them to take ; and she continues these 

 manoeuvres until she has employed the whole lamina 

 that she had separated from her body, when she takes 

 a second, proceeding in the same manner. She gives 

 herself no care to compress the molecules of wax which 

 she has heaped together ; she is satisfied if they adhere 

 to each other. At length she leaves her work, and is 

 lost in the crowd of her companions. Anotlier succeeds, 

 and resumes the employment; then a third; all follow 

 the same plan of placing their little masses ; and if any 

 by chance gives them a contrary direction, another 

 coming removes them to their proper place. The re- 

 sult of all these operations is a mass or little wall of 

 wax with uneven surfaces, five or six lines long, two 

 lines high, and half a line thick, which descends per- 

 pendicularly below the vault of the hive. In this first 

 work is no angle nor any trace of the figure of the cells. 

 It is a simple partition in a right line without any in- 

 flection. 



The wax-makers having thus laid the foundation of 

 a comb, are succeeded by the nurse-bees, which are 

 alone competent to model and perfect the work. The 

 former are the labourers, Avho convey the stone and 

 mortar ; the latter the masons, who work them up into 

 the form which the intended structure requires. One 

 of the nurse-bees now places itself horizontally on the 

 vault of the hive, its head corresponding to the centre 

 of the mass or wall which the wax-makers have left, 

 and which is to form the partition of the comb into two 

 opposite assemblages of cells : and with its mandibles, 



