INSTINCT 227 



opposed side where the bees had worked less quickly. In one well- 

 marked instance, I put the comb back into the hive, and allowed 

 the bees to go on working for a short time, and again examined 

 the cell, and I found that the rhombic plate had been completed, 

 and had become perfectly fiat: it was absolutely impossible, from 

 the extreme thinness of the little plate, that they could have 

 effected this by gnawing away the convex side; and I suspect that 

 the bees in such cases stand on opposite sides, and push and bend 

 the ductile and warm wax (which as I have tried is easily done) 

 into its proper intermediate plane, and thus flatten it. 



From the experiment of the ridge of vermilion wax we can see 

 that, if the bees were to build for themselves a thin wall of wax, 

 they could make their cells of the proper shape, by standing at 

 the proper distance from each other, by excavating at the same 

 rate, and by endeavoring to make equal spherical hollows, but 

 never allowing the spheres to break into each other. Now bees, as 

 may be clearly seen by examining the edge of a growing comb, 

 do make a rough, circumferential wall or rim all round the comb; 

 and they gnaw this away from the opposite sides, always working 

 circularly as they deepen each cell. They do not make the whole 

 three-sided pyramidal base of any one cell at the same time, but 

 only that one rhombic plate which stands on the extreme growing 

 margin, or the two plates, as the case may be; and they never 

 complete the upper edges of the rhombic plates, until the hex- 

 agonal walls are commenced. Some of these statements differ from 

 those made by the justly celebrated elder Huber, but I am con- 

 vinced of their accuracy; and if I had space, I could show that 

 they are conformable with my theory. 



Huber's statement, that the very first cell is excavated out of a 

 little parallel-sided wall of wax, is not, as far as I have seen, 

 strictly correct; the first commencement having always been a 

 little hood of wax; but I will not here enter on details. We see how 

 important a part excavation plays in the construction of the cells; 

 but it would be a great error to suppose that the bees cannot build 

 up a rough wall of wax in the proper position — that is, along the 

 plane of intersection between two adjoining spheres. I have several 

 specimens showing clearly that they can do this. Even in the rude 

 circumferential rim or wall of wax round a growing comb, flexures 

 may sometimes be observed, corresponding in position to the 

 planes of the rhombic basal plates of future cells. But the rough 

 wall of wax has in every case to be finished off, by being largely 

 gnawed away on both sides. The manner in which the bees build 

 is curious; they always make the first rough wall from ten to 



