BEES, Yj 



cells of the wasp, which are subject to the same laws as 

 those of the hive-bee, we find the plates of wooden fibre 

 which surround and protect the nest, to be invariably of a 

 slig-ht bowl-hke form, as if the wasp had fixed itself on its 

 feet as a pivot, and with its jaws spread the fibrous mass 

 into small sheets. The cocoons of various insects, when pass- 

 ing into the pupa state, are all examples of the circular instinct. 

 The same instinct is apparent even in the higher animals. 

 When a bird commences her nest, she arranges a tuft of 

 hay or grass in a fork, seats herself in the centre of it, and 

 spins rapidly round, so as to form a circular depression; 

 after which she works the materials round the edge of this 

 depression. The same thing is seen in the nest of the 

 harvest-mouse. Were not the bees so economical of wax, 

 the whole number of cells would probably be cylindrical ; 

 but their care of their wax induces them to scrape away as 

 much as can be spared at the junction of the cells. Now 

 if a cylinder is surrounded by other cylinders of equal dia- 

 meter, six will exactly reach round it ; and if the points of 

 junction of the central cylinder were scooped away, the 

 cylinder would immediately become hexagonal or six-sided. 

 So ^.t is with the first set of cells ; but the bees having 

 already a hexagonal model on which to work, do not trou- 

 ble themselves to build cylinders, and then cut away the 

 angles, but work hexagonal cells at once, only the first 

 set being made on the cylindrical principle. 



Whilst this first block is thus being deposited in a straight 

 line across the roof of the hive, and hollowed out into cells 

 as fast as it is deposited, the work also continues down- 

 wards towards the floor of the hive, other blocks, or combs, 

 are commenced parallel with it, divided only from it and from 

 each other by the streets just mentioned, which are about 

 half an inch broad. And so the work will proceed until 

 the hive is filled with comb. Looking down upon the lines 

 of combs in a completed hive, they would present the shape 

 shown in Fig. 7, presuming the irregularity in the cen- 

 tre did not exist. And why does that irregularity exist? 

 The answer to this question forms one of the many proofs 

 of the weakness of the theory which attempts to divide by 

 strictly defined impassable barriers the faculties of bees, 

 imder the name of instinct, from the reason which 



