19'.>7 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



1021 



of soap-bubbles be confined, one layer between 

 two sheets of glass, and they become short 

 polygonal tubes, If sizes are equal and pres- 

 sure from every direction is the same the out- 

 lines will be regular hexagons, the same as 

 those of worker-comb cells If these condi- 

 tions vary, the outlines will be irregular 

 polygons but mostly six-sided. See Fig. 3. 

 Worker-cells seem to be more closely crowd- 

 ed together than drone-cells, and thus have 

 their angles, in most cases, more sharply 

 defined. In drone comb some cells are al- 

 most without angles, the spaces between the 

 tubes being filled in by a thickening of the 

 cell walls greater than is customary. See 

 Figs. 4 and 5. In such parts a casual glance 

 shows them to be almost as hexagonal as is 

 the usual type. But close examination or 

 magifying shows many cells that are cylin- 

 drical tubes, The more one studies comb, 

 tlie more firmly is he impressed by the be- 

 lief that the original "intention" of the bee 

 is to produce a hollow cylinder, and that the 

 hexagonal result is due solely to the force of 

 circumstances, and is entirely "uninten- 

 tional" 



A correspondent recently told me that, 

 after her house was burned down, workmen, 

 in clearing away the ruins, found in the cel- 

 lar, amid the debris, a box of glass "mar- 



bles" that had belonged to her young son. 

 Under the heat and the pressure the mar- 

 bles had become a solid mass; they had 

 "run together." A workman, in knocking 

 off the clinging cinders, broke the mass in 

 two. The interior presented an almost per- 

 fect honey-comb effect, each marble being a 

 spherical polygon. So cylinders or spheres, 

 pressed together uniformly in every direction, 

 and submitting to that pressure, become 

 hexagonal in outline. 



Much has been written about the mathe- 

 matically exact angles of honey-comb. Some 

 philosophers have stoutly maintained that 

 the bees have solved difficult problems, and 

 that their work is an example of the wonder- 

 ful perfection of nature or of natural in- 

 stinct. Many of these claims make interest, 

 ing reading. Abstruse theories and complex 

 formulaj have been contributed to sustain 

 these claims. But they lack one essential 

 feature, and in this they do not stand alone, 

 even in the productions of writers on natu- 

 ral history — they are not true. 



Actual measurements of the angles show 

 that they greatly vary. But, notwithstand- 

 ing the fact that the cells vary in size and 

 form, comb is none the less a wonderful 

 structure, with all its parts arranged for the 

 greatest strength, the largest storing capac- 



A STUDY IN CELL-MAKING. 



Note that the cells are made independent of each other, andlthat it is the refuse'wax.'like droppings cf m .i- 

 tar in brick-laying, that seems to tumble into the interstices to fill up. 



