112 ARCHITECTURE OF BEES. 



the direction of their combs, wheii I approximated a 

 surface too smooth to admit of their clustering on it. 

 They always sought the wooden sides. I thus com- 

 pelled them to curve the combs in the strangest shapes, 

 by placing a pane of glass at a certain distance from 

 their edges. These results indicate a degree of in- 

 stinct truly wonderful. They denote even more than 

 instinct ; for glass is not a substance against which 

 bees can be warned by nature. In trees, their natu- 

 ral abode, there is nothing that resembles it, or with 

 the same polish. The most singular part of their 

 proceeding is changing the direction of the work, be- 

 fore arriving at the surface cf the glass, and while yet 

 at a distance suitable for doing so. Do they antici- 

 pate the inconvenience which would attend any other 

 mode .of building ? No less curious is the plan adopted 

 by the bees for producing an angle in the combs ; 

 the wonted fashion of the work, and the dimensions 

 of the cells, must be altered. Therefore, the cells 

 on the upper or convex side of the comb are enlarged.,; 

 they are constructed of three or four times the width 

 of those on the opposite surface. How can so many 

 insects, occupied at once on the edges of the combs, 

 concur in giving them a common curvature from one 

 extremity to the other ? How do they resolve on 

 establishing cells so small on one side, while dimen- 

 sions so enlarged are bestowed on those of the other ? 

 And is it not still more singular that they have the 

 art of making a correspondence between cells of such 

 reciprocal discrepance ? The bottom being common 

 to both, the tubes alone assume a taper form. Per- 





