The natural history of insects. First series.

Date:
1833
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The natural history of insects. First series. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    plasterers, who only bring the raw material, but do not give it shape. The former he calls the nurse- bees ; the latter, wax-workers. Wax is not, like honey, a simple substance 'ex- tracted by bees from the flower. On the contrary, it is a secretion found in the form of scales under their belly. The wax-workers, having gorged them- selves with the nectar of flowers, hang motionless in festoons'-in the hive; and in the course of twenty- four hours scales of a white matter like talc are formed under the rings of the abdomen. The nurse- bees secrete wax too, but in very inconsiderable quantities. Huber having provided a hive with ho- ney and Avateiyit was resorted to in crowds by bees, which, having satisfied their appetite, returned to the hive. They then formed festoons, remained mo- tionless for twenty-four hours, and after a time scales of wax appeared. An adequate supply of wax for the construction of a comb having been elaborated, one of the bees disengaged itself from the centre of the group, and clearing a space about an inch in dia meter, at the top of the hive, applied the pincers of one of its legs to its side, detached a scale of wax, and immediately began to mince it with the tongue. During the operation, this organ was made to as- sume every variety of shape; sometimes it appeared liko a trowel, then flattened like a spatula, and at other times like a pencil ending in a point. The scale, moistened with a frothy liquid, became gluti- nous, and Avas drawn out like a riband. This bee, Avhich iduber has immortalized by the epithet of “ founder,” then attached all the Avax it could con- coct to the vault of the hive, and Avent its way; a second now succeeded, and did the like; a third tol- loAved, but, OAving to some blunder, did not put the wax in the same line Avith that placed by its prede- cessor; upon Avhich, says Huber, “another bee, ap- parently sensible of the defect, removed the dis- placed wax, and carrying it to the former heap, de-