COMBS, AND THE FORM OF CELLS 89 



work in. Now, I want to point out some more of the 

 wonders of its construction, how the bees 



' . . . In fiiin phalanx ply their twinkling feet, 

 Stretch out the ductile mass, and form the street. 

 With many a cross way path and postern gate. 

 That shorten to their range the spreading state.' 



Evans. 



And as we do this, I think we shall see it affording 

 another instance of that marvellous instinct which 

 guides the bee in all it does, and makes it the cleverest 

 of architects and the best of builders. 



We often talk of the wonders of engineering skill 

 and man's ingenuity seen in countless inventions. We 

 look, for instance, with wonder at our railroads and 

 viaducts, and great bridges, and call them monuments 

 of engineering skill. 



There is, for instance, the marvellous great iron 

 bridge across the Menai Straits, which hangs as a 

 great iron tunnel suspended high up from rock to 

 rock over the waters far below, and yet is so safe and 

 strong that the heaviest railway trains are continually 

 and with safety passing over it. No one can see it with- 

 out admiration of the great skill with which it has been 

 planned, and of the perfect workmanship shown in its 

 construction. Everything is provided by countless and 

 exact calculations to make it strong and secure. And 

 it was just for the want of some of these calculations, 

 and some consequent fault of construction, that 

 on the night of December 28th, 1879, another great 

 railway bridge, that over the Firth of Tay, in Scot- 

 land, failed to withstand the force of a great gale of 

 wind, and in the darkness of the night, and when a 



