24 CONVERSATIONS ON 



to divide it into separate cells. So she com- 

 mences at the bottom, and puts in a quantity of 

 what is called bee-bread, until it reaches about 

 an inch in height ; on the top of this she lays 

 an egg, and the bread is put there to feed the 

 young one as soon as it comes out of the egg. 

 She then makes a floor over it out of the dust, 

 as I told you ; she knows how to glue this 

 dust together, and she brings it grain by grain 

 from the heap in which she put it when she 

 first brought it out : and she always begins 

 by gluing the dust around the outside of the 

 hole she has bored, and then glues another 

 ring to that, and then another, and another, 

 making each ring smaller and smaller, until 

 she has it all filled ; so that her floor, when it 

 is done, appears like a parcel of rings of 

 smaller and smaller sizes placed within each 

 other. On the top of this floor she puts bee- 

 bread, as before, and places another egg on it, 

 and then covers it with a floor again ; and so 

 she goes on making cells and filling them with 

 bread, and covering each with a floor, until 

 she has filled up the hole." 



" Uncle Philip, how do the young bees get 

 out when the egg is hatched ? It seems as if 

 they were shut up for ever in prison." 



" No, boys ; there is a way for them to get 



