3 



this question more minutely another time-, when speak- 

 ing on the three stemmirta found on the crown of the 

 head, and supposed to be eyes to enable the bee to see 

 in the depths of the dark cells in the midst of combs, 

 and I trust you will all be enabled to examine for yourselves 

 these external differences of structure. I must here beg to 

 thank Mr. Horsnaill for his kind assistance in refreshing my 

 memory of the anatomy of the bee, and with his very use- 

 ful microscope I hope he will able to show you what his 

 own steady hand and clear young eyes have done to prove 

 many points that may be still considered moot points in the 

 anatomy of insects ; and I believe I shall be able to show 

 you that the proboscis of the honey bee is a hollow tube, 

 through which the honey is sucked or pumped up, and 

 which I have examined, and stated as a fact, as I have seen 

 the colored sugar, &c., pass up into the oesophagus, «&c., 

 although I have seen so many statements made in bee books 

 that contradict this, and add that the proboscis is solid and 

 not tubular. It is, then, with this ^-iew, as we are, so often 

 led away by arguments which take things for granted 

 after the examination has proceeded so far, that I now beg 

 this Society to enter into a quiet and thorough examination 

 of the entire history of the honey bee, and give a stamp to 

 it and an authority as a body, not anxious to be new dis- 

 coverers, but as confirming if possible all that is true and 

 exact, that has been stated by those enquirers who have 

 gone before ; and I believe this would tend to check the 

 great impositions put upon anxious and innocent enquirers 

 into the truth of this mystery of nature, and at any rate 

 remove from the field the " book-making " and " bee-hive 

 selling " impostors of the day. Having alluded to the 

 hexagonal form of the cells and that the facet of the eyes 

 (which are also hexagonal), might have something to do 

 with the form, the bee ultimately chases, or chisels out, 

 the fi.rst roundly formed brood and honey cells, whilst 

 that wonderful instinct of economy of material, also seems 

 to direct their workings of the interior of the cells. I 



