ARCHITECTURE. 197 
arrangement. For the fabric of the nest is thus 
materially strengthened, by substituting, at this vital 
point, a hard, dry, light flooring for the loose, damp 
comb, which is almost ready to fall to pieces by its 
own weight. 
When a new stage is to be constructed, the wasps 
begin by raising the walls of two or three adjommg 
cells in the centre of the lowest comb. From these 
diverging roots a round cord is drawn out, as it 
were, on the end of which little cells are made, just 
as on the end of the footstalk from which the nest 
originally sprung. As each cell takes shape an egg 
is deposited in it, so as to lose no time; and while 
its walls are gradually rising, the comb is gradually 
spreading, by concentric rings of cells. The mother 
wasp follows close on the traces of the worker, and 
the circles of larvee of the same age shew the system 
on which the comb has been made. As the comb 
spreads, new stays are let down to support the 
weight increasing with the width. Meanwhile the 
expansion of the case keeps exact pace with the 
lateral growth of the comb; the old case is nibbled 
away within, and new paper is laid on outside, so 
as to make room all round the edge. And, before 
each stage has attained its full dimensions, another 
has been commenced below it, just in the same 
manner. 
There is something in all this very different to the 
economy of a bee-hive. There all the building in- 
stinct is concentrated in one point, and the only 
variety which the work offers, beyond the distinction 
of large and small cells, is the occasional appearance 
of a queen cell, disfiguring the symmetry of the 
