PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 175 



brane of the wax-pockets, may be concerned in this 

 operation. This substance he also discovered in humble- 

 bees (which though they make wax have no wax-pockets), 

 occupying all the anterior part or base of the segments 3 . 

 If you wish to see the wax-pockets in the hive-bee, y u 

 must press the abdomen so as to cause it to extend it- 

 self; you will then find on each of the four intermediate 

 ventral segments, separated by the carina or elevated 

 central part, two trapeziform whitish pockets, of a soft 

 membranaceous texture : on these the laminae of wax 

 are formed, and they are found upon them in different 

 states, so as to be more or less perceptible. I must here 

 observe that, besides Thorley, who seems to have been 

 the first apiarist that observed these laminae, Wildman 

 was not ignorant of them, nor of the wax being formed 

 from honey 5 : we must not therefore permit foreigners 

 to appropriate to themselves the whole credit of disco- 

 veries that have been made, or at least partially made, 

 by our own countrymen. 



Long before Linne had discovered the nectary of 

 flowers, our industrious creatures had made themselves 

 intimate with every form and variety of them ; and no 

 botanist, even in this enlightened era of botanical sci- 

 ence, can compare with a bee in this respect. The 

 station of these reservoirs, even where the armed sight 

 of science cannot discover it, is in a moment detected 

 by the microscopic eye of this animal. 



She has to attend to a double task to collect mate- 

 rials for bee-bread as well as for honey and wax. Ob- 

 serve a bee that has alighted upon an open flower. 

 The hum produced by the motion of her wings ceases, 

 a Huber, ii. 5. t. u.f. 8. b Wildman, 43. 



