BEES-WAX. 359 



precincts of a room, so closed as to admit only a 

 renewal of the air. At the end of five days as 

 many cakes of beautifully white, though very 

 fragile wax, were suspended from the roof; the 

 honey had totally disappeared. Still however, as 

 there was a possibility that the thighs and sto- 

 machs of the bees might have conveyed pollen 

 from the parent hive, he withdrew these five 

 combs, and replaced the bees in the hive with a 

 fresh supply of honey and water ; they renewed 

 their toil with unabated industry, and soon fabri- 

 cated new combs : these last were taken from them ; 

 when the patient and indefatigable insects com- 

 menced a third structure of comb. Five times 

 in succession were their works thus completed 

 and removed, although during the whole of this 

 period they were fed merely with honey and 

 water, and could not possibly have had access to 

 farina. 



These experiments, so uniform in their results, 

 give indubitable validity to the fact, that honey, 

 through the organic intervention of bees, may be 

 converted into wax. A contrary experiment was 

 made, by abundantly supplying a hive with fruit 

 and pollen only : but during eight days confine- 

 ment the bees produced no wax whatever, nor 

 exhibited any plates under their abdominal rings ; 

 no combs were formed, nor was an atom of farina 

 touched, a clear proof that farina supplies neither 



