INSTINCT OF INSECTS. 485 
ancients under the names of Mitys or Commosis and Pis- 
soceros, which they substitute in the place of the remov- 
ed sides of the cells, forming of it thick and massive 
walls and heavy and shapeless pillars, which they intro- 
duce:between the comb and the top of the hive so as to 
agelutinate them firmly together. Huber, who first in 
modern times witnessed this remarkable modification of 
the architecture of bees, observed, that not only are they 
careful not to touch the bottoms of the cells, but that 
they do not remove at once the cells on both sides of the 
comb, which in that case might fall down; but they 
work alternately, first on one side and then on the other, 
replacing the demolished cells as they proceed, with 
mitys, which firmly fixes the comb to its support. 
The object of this substitution of mitys for wax seems 
clear. While the combs are new and only partially 
filled with honey, the first range of cells, originally es- 
tablished as the base and the guide for the pyramidal 
bottoms of the subsequent ones, serves as a sufficient 
support for them. But when they contain a store of se- 
veral pounds, the bees seem to foresee the danger of 
such a weight proving too heavy for the thin waxen 
walls by which the combs are suspended, and provi- 
dently hasten to substitute for them thicker walls, and 
pillars of a more compact and viscid material. 
But their foresight does not stop here. When they 
have sufficient wax, they make their combs of such a 
breadth as to extend to the sides of the hive, to which 
they cement them by constructions approaching more 
or less to the shape of cells. But when a scarcity of 
wax happens before they have been able to give to their 
combs the requisite diameter, a large vacant space is left 
