INSTINCT OF INSECTS. 4-79 



lozenge-shaped bottoms ; and having mixed the wax 

 with propolis, they form a cement well known to the 

 ancients under the names of Mitys, Commosis and Pis- 

 soceros, which they substitute in the place of the remov- 

 ed sides of the cells, forming of it thick and massive 

 walls and heavy and shapeless pillars, which they intro- 

 duce between the comb and the top of the hive so as to 

 agglutinate them firmly together. Huber, who first in 

 modern times witnessed this remarkable modification of 

 the architecture of bees, observed, that not only are they 

 careful not to touch the bottoms of the cells, but that 

 they do not remove at once the cells on both sides of the 

 comb, which in that case might fall down; but they 

 work alternately, first on one side and then on the other, 

 replacing the demolished cells as they proceed, with 

 mitys, which firmly fixes the comb to its support. 



The object of this substitution of mitys for wax seems 

 clear. While the combs are new and only partially 

 filled with honey, the first range of cells, originally es- 

 tablished as the base and the guide for the pyramidal 

 bottoms of the subsequent ones, serves as a sufficient 

 support for them. But when they contain a store of se- 

 veral pounds, the bees seem to foresee the danger of 

 such a weight proving too heavy for the thin waxen walls 

 by which the combs are suspended, and providently 

 hasten to substitute for them thicker walls, and pillars 

 of a more compact and viscid material. 



But their foresight does not stop here. When they 

 have sufficient wax, they make their combs of such a 

 breadth as to extend to the sides of the hive, to which 

 they cement them by constructions approaching more 

 or less to the shape of cells. But when a scarcity of 



