Note 13 — DARWINISM.
Reading edition
‘Origin of Species,’ p. 270. Mr. Darwin shows how the hexagonal cells of the hive-bee can have arisen from the simple cylindrical form, by bringing the cylinders sufficiently near together, so that their outlines, if completed, would intersect.
The humble-bee makes separate and very irregular rounded cells.
The melipona domestica makes cells that are nearly spherical, but too near together for the spheres to be complete, flat walls of wax being built where they tend to intersect.
A little extra regularity, advantageous for the saving of wax and labour, would produce the symmetrical comb of the hive-bee with its two layers of hexagonal prisms.