NATURALIST'S CABINET. 



Meal of flowers a favorite repast. 



each other. An interval or street between them 

 is always left, that the bees may have a free pas- 

 sage, and an easy communication with the diffe- 

 rent combs in the hive. These streets are just 

 wide enough to allow two bees to pass one ano- 

 ther. Beside these parallel streets, to shorten 

 their journey when working, they leave several 

 cross passages, which are always covered. The 

 cells for their young are most carefully formed ; 

 those designed for lodging the drones, are-iarger 

 than the rest; and that for the queen-bee, the 

 largest of all. 



Honey is not the only food upon which these 

 animals subsist. The meal of flowers, of which 

 their wax is formed, is one of the most favourite 

 repasts. This is a diet which they live upon 

 during the summer, and of which they lay up a 

 large winter provision. The wax of which their 

 combs are made, is no more than this meal di- 

 gested, and wrought into a paste. When the 

 flowers upon which bees generally feed, are not 

 fully blown, and this meal or dust is not offered 

 in sufficient quantities, the bees pinch the tops 

 of the stamina in which it is contained, with 

 their teeth: and thus anticipate the progress of 

 vegetation. In April and May the bees are busy, 

 from morning to evening, in gathering this meal; 

 but when the weather becomes too hot in the 

 midst of summer, they work only in the morning. 



This animal is furnished with a stomach for 

 its wax as well as its honey. In the former of 



