ARCHITECTURE OF BEES. 73 
passage crosswise from comb to comb, whereby much time and travel 
is saved to the bees. The bees build their cells of a hexagonal form, 
having six equal sides, There are only three forms in which the bees 
can possibly build their cells and make them all equal, without the 
lost of either material or space; viz.: The equilateral triangle, the 
square, and the regular hexagon. Of these three geometrical figures, 
the hexagon most completely unites the prime requisites for insect 
architecture. First, economy of material; second, economy of room ; 
thirdly, the greatest possible capacity, or internal space; fourthly, 
economy of materials and economy of room, produce economy of 
labor. And lastly, the greatest strength with the least amount of 
material. 
Huber asserts that the “design of every comb is sketched out, and 
the first rudiments laid by one single bee; that this founder-bee forms 
a block out of a rough mass of wax, drawn partly from its own re- 
sources, but principally from those of other bees, which furnish mate- 
rials, in quick succession, from the receptacles under their bellies, tak- 
ing out the plates of wax with their hind feet, and carrying them to their 
mouths with their fore feet, where the wax is moistened and masti- 
cated, till it becomes soft and ductile.” 
Huber was enabled by means of his observatory hive to bring 
each bee so completely under his view, that she might be seen to ex- 
tract with her hind feet one of the plates of wax from under the 
scales of her body, where they were lodged, and carrying it to her 
mouth in a vertical position, turn it round so that every part of its 
border was made to pass in succession under the cutting edge of the 
jaws. It was thus soon divided into very small fragments; and a 
frothy liquor was poured upon it from the tongue, so as to form a 
perfectly plastic mass. This liquor gave the wax a whiteness and opa- 
city which it did not possess originally, and at the same time rendered it 
tenacious and ductile. The scales of wax thus prepared by the bees, are 
applied by them to.the roof or side of the hive, as the case may be; and 
thus a block is raised of a semi-lenticular shape, thick at top and taper- 
ing towards the edges. When of sufficient size, a cell is sculptured on 
one side of it by the wax-working bees, who relieve one another in 
succession, sometimes to the number of twenty, before the cell is com- 
4 
