400 EXPERIMENTS OF DE JUSSIEU. 



into the dissemination of so preposterous a doctrine as that 

 which is contained in his definition of the nature of pollen. 

 It requires very little proficiency in natural history to know 

 that the farina of plants, and the saccharine juices secreted 

 at the bottom of their pistils or nectarium, are two distinct 

 and heterogeneous matters. No act nor elaboration in the 

 stomach of the bee can possibly convert the farina into 

 honey. There is no affinity whatever in the two substances ; 

 and when it is experimentally proved that honey exists in 

 nature as an individual substance, and is to be found by the 

 bee in projecting its proboscis to the bottom of the pistil 

 of the flower, we cannot but conceive that the most direct 

 ignorance could alone have prompted any individual to dis- 

 seminate so wild and improbable a story, as that farina is 

 the fundamental element of honey. Were pollen analyzed 

 into one hundred parts, we do not believe that it would con- 

 tain five of saccharine matter. In its constitution it is 

 diametrically opposite, nor can any analogy with honey be 

 found by the profoundest skill of the chemist, or the ela- 

 borate internal powers of the bee. 



In the Encyclopedic Methodique, under the article " Bee," 

 we find the following observations on the origin of wax : — 



" If any reliance is to be placed on the most exact obser- 

 vations, wax is contained in the stamina of the flowers. M. 

 Bernard de Jussieu, a man of science, and who would not 

 suffer himself to be easily imposed upon, asserts this fact 

 after the most minute experiments. The grains of the farina 

 of the stamina, which he put into water, swelled until they 

 burst. At the time when one of these grains burst, there 

 resulted from it a little globule of an oily and unctuous 

 licpior, which floated on the water, without ever incorporat- 

 ing with it. I have repeated this experiment a number of 

 times, and with the same success; but I do not believe that 

 it is sufficient to prove that the matter, which is destined by 



