488 INSTINCT OF INSECTS. 



upon which the hexagonal sides are subsequently raised, 

 as in their operation of cell-building. This course of 

 proceeding is invariable : they never extend a comb 

 in any direction whatever, without having first made 

 its edges thinner, diminishing its thickness in a portion 

 sufficiently large to leave no angular projection. — 

 Huber observes, and with reason, in relating this sur- 

 prising law which obliges bees partially to demolish 

 the cells situated upon the edges of the combs, that it 

 deserves a more close examination than he found him- 

 self competent to give it : for, if we may to a certain 

 point form a conception of the instinct which leads 

 these animals to employ their art of building cells, yet 

 how can we conceive of that which in particular cir- 

 cumstances forces them to act in an opposite direction, 

 and determines them to demolish what they have so la- 

 boriously constructed'' ? 



Drones, or male bees, are more bulky than the work* 

 ers ; and you have been told, in speaking of the habi- 

 tations of insects, that the cells which bees construct 

 for rearing the larvas of the former, are larger than 

 those destined for the education of the larvEE of the 

 latter. The diameter of the cells of drones is always 

 ^~ lines (or twelfths of an inch) ; thatof those of workers 

 2f lines : and these dimensions are so constant, that 

 some authors have thought they might be adopted as 

 an universal and invariable scale of measure, which 

 would have the great recommendation of being every 

 where at hand, and at all events would be preferable 

 to our barley-corns. Several ranges of male cells, 

 eametimes from thirty to forty, are usually found in 



* Huber, ii, 228. 



