INSTINCTS OF BEES. 325 



tiocination in a wasp, which had caught a fly nearly 

 as large as itself. Kneeling down, the Doctor 

 saw the wasp dissever the head and tail from the 

 trunk of the fly, and attempt to soar with the 

 latter : but finding when about two feet from the 

 ground that the wings of the fly carried too much 

 sail, and caused its prize and itself to be whirled 

 about, by a little breeze that had arisen, it drop- 

 ped upon the ground with its prey, and delibe- 

 rately sawed off with its mandibles, first one wing 

 and then the other : having thus removed these 

 impediments to its progress, the wasp flew away 

 with its booty, and experienced no further moles- 

 tation from the wind. 



Some of the proceedings of bees in glass hives 

 cannot be referred to their instinctive faculties, 

 glass being a substance which would never be 

 presented to them in their natural state. " Having 

 frequently observed," says DR. EVANS, " on the 

 inside of my glass hives, prior to the formation of 

 cells, a number of gluey spots ranged at regular 

 distances, I supposed them at first to be intended 

 as a kind of land-marks, pointing out the divisions 

 of the future streets, &c. On re-examination, 

 however, I found them evidently used as so many 

 footstools on the slippery glass, each bee resting 

 on one of these with its middle pair of legs, while 

 the fore-claws were hooked with the hind ones of 



