The Foundation of the City 
the hive into which the bees have been 
gathered be covered from top to bottom 
with leaves of foundation-wax, they will 
not waste time in erecting buildings across 
or beside these, or in producing useless 
wax, but, finding that the work is already 
half finished, they will be satisfied to 
deepen and lengthen each of the cells 
designed in the leaf, carefully rectifying 
these where there is the slightest devia- 
tion from the strictest vertical. Proceed- 
ing in this fashion, therefore, they will 
possess in a week a city as luxurious and 
well-constructed as the one they have 
quitted; whereas, had they been thrown 
on their own resources, it would have 
taken them two or three months to con- 
struct so great a profusion of dwellings 
and storehouses of shining wax. 
143 
