“It builds cells, that is to say storehouses, where the honey is preserved, and little rooms where the young bees in the form of larvæ are raised.”
“It builds its house, then,” put in Emile, “with the layers of wax taken from the folds of its stomach. And there, you see, the bee shows a very original and inventive mind. It is as if, in order to build a house, we should rub our sides so as to get from them the blocks of cut stone we needed.”
“The snail,” concluded Uncle Paul, “has already accustomed us to these original ideas of animals. It sweats the stone for its shell.”
CHAPTER LXXVIII
THE CELLS
“IN order to store the supply of honey and lodge the larvæ, the bees build with their wax little rooms called cells, open at one end and closed at the other. They are six-sided and arranged with perfect regularity. In geometrical terms, each would be called a hexagonal prism, or a prism with six facets.
“Do not be surprised at this introduction of terms belonging to the beautiful and severe science of form—of geometry, in short. Bees are geometricians of consummate skill. Their constructions have required the exercise of the highest intelligence. All the power of human reason was necessary to follow, step by step, the insect’s science. I will return presently to this fine subject, a very difficult one, but I will try to make it intelligible to you.
“The cells are placed horizontally, back to back and end to end, in pairs, with the closed ends joining. Furthermore, they are arranged side by side in greater or less number, and they touch each other by their flat faces, each one of which serves as partition wall for two contiguous cells. The two layers of cells, back to back at their closed ends, constitute what is called a comb or honey-comb. On one side of this comb are found all the entrances to the cells of the corresponding layer; on the other side the cells of the second layer open. Finally, the honey-comb is suspended vertically in the hive, with half its openings to the right and half to the left. It adheres by its upper edge to the roof of the hive, or to the bars that cross it inside.
“One comb is not enough when the population is numerous; others are constructed like the first. The various combs, ranged parallel to one another, leave free intervening spaces. These are the streets, the public squares, the thoroughfares, on which the openings of the two layers of cells belonging to neighboring combs give, as the doors of our houses open on the right and left of a street. There the bees circulate, going from one door to another to deposit their honey in the cells used as storehouses, or to distribute nourishment to the young larvæ lodged one by one in other cells. In these same public places they assemble when necessary, hold consultations, and deliberate on the affairs of the community. There, for example, among the nurses going from door to door to see whether the larvæ need feeding, and the wax-bees rubbing themselves vehemently to extract the wax and begin to build, is plotted the extermination of the drones; there, when the birth of a new queen menaces the hive with civil war, the project of emigration ripens. There—But let us not anticipate. Let us return to the cells.”
“I am longing to know the whole of the strange story of the bees,” Jules broke in.