466 SKELTON. 



web was not so strong, nor so carefully constructed as 

 the preceding one, it was yet formed with the same 

 peculiarities of zig-zag lacings of a thickened tissue 

 corresponding to the Saltier position of the Spider's 

 legs. I have since, in the course of my natural 

 history researches, met with some three of these 

 Spiders (they are rather scarce), and the same pecu- 

 liarity prevailed in alL Sloane evidently noticed it, 

 hut does not seem to have understood its purposes."* 



STINGLESS BEES. 



Everything relating to the marvellous instincts of 

 Bees is so entertaining, that the following extract from 

 the Journal of my esteemed friend, Mr. Hill, needs no 

 apology. 



*' November 8fh, 1847. — I was exceedingly in- 

 terested this afternoon by the sight of two hives of 

 indigenous Bees, shown to me by Mr. Garriques at 

 Skelton Pen, on the banks of the Rio Cobre. The 

 one hive, in the hollow of a Calabash-tree, had an 

 entrance about half an inch wide at midway up the 

 trunk, the cavity being supposed to descend some 

 four feet down. The other was in a Cordia Cherry- 

 tree, and was laid bare by a considerable portion of 

 the tree being cut away. The cutting just disclosed 

 the uppermost of the brood cells, but nothing of the 

 sacklets that contained the honey. I take our bees to 

 be similar to, if not the same with, the bee of Mexico, 

 a Melipona or Trigona, called by the Spaniards 

 Angelitos, from having no stings. They settled upon 



* See his description at p. 196. vol. ii. 



