314 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book IV. 



to be feen almofl in every garden, but at the fame time a moft ufe- 

 ful animal j for the honey they produce, 



Acrii mellis coekftla dona. 



as Virgil calls it, is a mofl; delicious fiveetmeat, and when joined 

 with the milk of the cow made into butter, is in my opinion the 

 fine ft of all human food ; fo fine, that the Prophet Ifaiah could de- 

 vife nothing finer for the food of the Meffiah ; and accordingly he 

 Jias prophecied, ' That butter and honey he pall eat.'' Nor do I 

 think that there could be a greater praife of a country, as abounding 

 with the fineft food for man, than what was faid of the land of Ca- 

 naan, ' that it flowed with milk and honey.' What the bees 

 extra<Sl from the flower of the plant muft be fomething much 

 finer than either its ftem or even its feed, and may be faid to be 

 its quintcjfcncc. Upon this the bees not only feed during the fum- 

 mer, but colledl it and lay it up in ftore for the winter ; and fiar 

 that purpofe they muft make certain fl:ore-houfes that we call 

 combs ^ the materials of which, that is voax^ they colled, as well as 

 the honey, from plants. The combs are divided into fmall cells of 

 an hexagonal figure, which join together fo exadly that they make 

 but one piece of comb, and are fo contrived, that with the fmalleft 

 expence of wax the greateft quantity pofilble of honey is contained. 

 Both the honey and the wax come, as I have faid, from the garden 

 and the field : But the combs are laid up in trunks of hollow trees 

 or holes of the earth or of rocks where the bees lodge, or in thofe 

 houies we have made for them, which we call hives. Here then is 

 the greateft bufinefs carried on, both within doors and without, of 

 which Xenophon has given us a very accurate, and I think a very 

 curious, account *. And from what he has faid of it, I am per- 

 fuaded that no polity in Europe is fo well governed. They have a 

 queen he fays, who conducts the whole bufinefs of the ftate : She 



always 

 * Lib. 5. Memorab. De AJmlniftratlone Domeflica, p. 839. Ed. Lttaulavii. 



