The Life of the Bee 
eyes and the triple cyclopean eye on their 
brow—but as it would seem to us, were we 
of their stature. From the height of a dome 
more colossal than that of St. Peter’s at 
Rome, waxen walls descend to the ground, 
balanced in the void and the darkness; 
gigantic and manifold, vertical and parallel 
geometric constructions, to which, for re- 
lative precision, audacity, and vastness, no 
human structure is comparable. Each of 
these walls, whose substance still is imma- 
culate and fragrant, of virginal, silvery 
freshness, contains thousands of cells stored 
with provisions sufficient to feed the whole 
people for several weeks. Here, lodged 
in transparent cells, are the pollens, love- 
ferment of every flower of spring, mak- 
ing brilliant splashes of red and yellow, 
of black and mauve. Close by, sealed 
with a seal to be broken only in days of 
supreme distress, the honey of April is 
stored, most limpid and perfumed of all, 
in twenty thousand reservoirs that form a 
long and magnificent embroidery of gold, 
whose borders hang stiff and rigid. Still 
lower the honey of May matures, in great 
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