244 INQUIRY CONCERNING 
“‘ bees’? the doctor means, what I prefume he does, the 
true honey-bees. The genus apzs, or bee, it fhould be. 
remembered, is very extenfive. ‘The learned entomolo- 
gift Fabricius, in, his Species Infectorum, which was pub-- 
lifhed in 1781, has given us the names and difcriminative, 
characters of eighty-iwo {pecies. Of this number fixteen~ 
are faid to be natives of the two continents. and iflands of 
America. There can be little doubt that there are many, 
more. Many of thefe bees, befide the apzs mellifica, form 
honey. We {hall prefently fee, from Clavigero, that in. 
the country of Mexico, there are, at leaft, fix {pecies. Nor 
is the bee the only infe& which forms honey. Some {pe- 
cies of the genus ve/pa, or walp, do the fame, depofiting 
their fores in trees, in the earth, &c. Without, therefore, 
fomething more particular concerning the wax which was 
procured by. Columbus.ia Hifpaniola, we ought not to con- 
clude that it was the production of the honey-bee, and. 
with the. lights which we have already received, we are 
nearly authorifed to affirm that it was not. 
It is much more probable,.that this wax was the fabric. 
of fome other fpecies of the. bee. It is not impoflible,, 
however, that.it was the produce of .a, vegetable, fince we 
re acquainted with fome plants which furnifh large quan- 
tities of wax: fuch is the Myrica cerzfera, which grows 
very commonly in various parts of the new-world, as well 
as in the fouthern countries of Africa. 
Dr. Belknap’s fecond argument feems to deferve more 
attention. “ The indefatigable Purchas,” fays he, ‘* gives 
us an account, of the revenues of the empire of Mexi- 
co, before the arrival of the Spaniards, as.defcribed in its 
annals; which were pictures drawn on cotton cloth. A- 
mong other articles he exhibits the figures of covered pots, 
with two handles, which are faid to be pots of ‘bees ho~ 
nie*,?* 
