128 FARINA. 



all the food which a cow eats contributes to the pro- 

 duction of milk, or, to adopt a nearer simile from the 

 insect tribe, as all the food which a spider takes con- 

 tributes not only to the nourishment of the animal, but 

 to the production of the substance of the cob- web from 

 its body. Numberless other analogies in nature might 

 be adduced in favour of the probability of this theory. 

 The silk, for instance, produced from the body of the 

 silk-worm, is a substance as different from that of the 

 animal itself, or of the mulberry leaf it feeds on, as 

 wax is from that of the body of the bee, or of the 

 honey or flower she su<*ks. And the excrescence pro- 

 duced in the human ear, which also goes by the name 

 of wax, is certainly a substance as different from that 

 of the body which produces it as either the one or the 

 other. Upon the whole, until I meet with a more 

 probable theory, supported by facts, I must give it as 

 my humble opinion that the wax is produced from the 

 body of the bee alone, or rather, that the bees can 

 speedily convert into wax what they bring from the 

 flowers, and therewith build their combs and seal up 

 both their young and their honey."* 



Farina, or Pollen. Farina, or Pollen, is the ferti- 

 lizing dust of flowers and forms a very important ingre- 

 dient in the nourishment of the young bees. Before 

 the discovery of the true origin of wax, it was supposed 

 to constitute the rude material of that substance, being 

 taken into the stomach and converted by some pecu- 

 liar action of that organ, into real wax ; and hence, 

 among French naturalists, it had obtained the name 

 * Bonner on Bees, p. 195. 



