BEES 



265 



rapidity and precision of their movements whilst thus 

 engaged are wonderful. They first scrape the clay with 

 their mandibles ; the small portions gathered are then 

 cleared by the anterior paws and passed to the second pair 

 of feet, which, in their turn, convey them to the large 

 foliated expansions of the hind shanks which are adapted 

 normally in bees, as every one knows, for the collection of 

 pollen. The middle feet pat the growing pellets of mortar 

 on the hind legs to keep them in a compact shape as the 

 particles are successively added. The little hodsmen 

 soon have as much as they can carry, and they then fly 

 off. I was for some time puzzled to know what the bees 

 did with the clay ; but I had afterwards plenty of oppor- 

 tunity for ascertaining. They construct their combs in 

 any suitable crevice in trunks of trees or perpendicular 

 banks, and the clay is required to build up a wall so as to 

 close the gap, with the exception of a small orifice for their 

 own entrance and exit. Most kinds of Meliponse are in 

 this way masons as well as workers in wax and pollen- 

 gatherers. One little species (undescribed) not more than 

 two lines long, builds a neat tubular gallery of clay, 

 kneaded with some viscid substance outside the entrance 

 to its hive, besides blocking up the crevice in the tree 

 within which it is situated. The mouth of the tube is 

 trumpet-shaped, and at the entrance a number of the 

 pigmy bees are always stationed apparently acting as 

 sentinels. 



It is remarkable that none of the American bees have 

 attained that high degree of architectural skill in the 

 construction of their comb which is shown by the European 

 hive-bee. The wax cells of the Meliponae are generally 

 oblong, showing only an approximation to the hexagonal 

 shape in places where several of them are built in contact. 

 It would appear that the Old World has produced in bees, 

 as well as in other families of animals, far more advanced 

 forms than the tropics of the New World. 



A hive of the Melipona fasciculata, which I saw opened, 

 contained about two quarts of pleasantly-tasted liquid 

 honey. The bees, as already remarked, have no sting, 

 but they bite furiously when their colonies are disturbed. 

 The Indian who plundered the hive was completely 

 covered by them ; they took a particular fancy to the hair 

 of his head, and fastened on it by hundreds. I found 

 forty-five species of these bees in different parts of the 



