Seite - 282 - in The Origin of Species

282 ORIGIN OF SPECIES Prof. Wyman, who has made numerous careful measure- ments, that the accuracy of the workmanship of the bee has been greatly exaggerated; so much so, that whatever the typical form of the cell may be, it is rarely, if ever, realised. Hence we may safely conclude that, if we could slightly modify the instincts already possessed by the Melipona, and in themselves not very wonderful, this bee would make a structure as wonderfully perfect as that of the hive-bee. We must suppose the Melipona to have the power of forming her cells truly spherical, and of equal sizes; and this would not be very surprising, seeing that she already does so to a certain extent, and seeing what perfectly cylindrical bur- rows many insects make in wood, apparently by turning round on a fixed point. We must suppose the Melipona to arrange her cells in level layers, as she already does her cylindrical cells; and we must further suppose, and this is the greatest difficulty, that she can somehow judge accu- rately at what distance to stand from her fellow-labourers when several are making their spheres; but she is already so far enabled to judge of distance, that she always describes her spheres so as to intersect to a certain extent; and then she unites the points of intersection by perfectly flat sur- faces. By such modifications of instincts which in them- selves are not very wonderful—hardly more wonderful than those which guide a bird to make its nest,—I believe that the hive-bee has acquired, through natural selection, her inimitable architectural powers. But this theory can be tested by experiment. Following the example of Mr. Tegetmeier, I separated two combs, and put between them a long, thick, rectangular strip of wax: the bees instantly began to excavate minute circular pits in it; and as they deepened these little pits, they made * them wider and wider until they were converted into shal- low basins, appearing to the eye perfectly true or parts of a sphere, and of about the diameter of a cell. It was most interesting to observe that, wherever several bees had be- gun to excavate these basins near together, they had begun their work at such a distance from each other, that by the time the basins had acquired the above-stated width (i. e. about the width of an ordinary cell), and were in depth