think herself of stopping the leakage at the
bottom of her jar.

At five o'clock in the evening, the works cease. They are resumed on
the morrow. This time, I neglect to clean out my artificial orifice and
leave the victuals gradually to ooze out by themselves. At length, the
egg is laid and the door sealed up, without anything being done by the
Bee in the matter of the disastrous breach. And yet to plug the hole
were an easy matter for her: a pellet of her mortar would suffice.
Besides, while the cup was still empty, did she not instantly close the
hole which I had made? Why are not those early repairs of hers repeated?
It clearly shows the creature's inability to retrace the course of its
actions, however slightly. At the time of the first breach, the cup was
empty and the insect was laying the first rows of bricks. The accident
produced through my agency concerned the part of the work which occupied
the Bee at the actual moment; it was a flaw in the building, such as can
occur naturally in new courses of masonry, which have not had time to
harden. In correcting that flaw, the Mason did not go outside her usual
work.

But, once the provisioning begins, the cup is finished for good and all;
and, come what may, the insect will not touch it again. The harvester
will go on harvesting, though the pollen trickle to the ground through
the drain. To plug the hole would imply a change of occupation of which
the insect is incapable for the moment. It is the honey's turn and not
the mortar's. The rule upon this point is invariable. A moment comes,
presently, when the harvesting is interrupted and the masoning resumed.
The edifice must be raised a storey higher. Will the Bee, once more a
builder, mixing fresh cement, now attend to the leakage at the bottom?
No more than before. What occupies her at present is the new floor,
whose brickwork would be repaired at once, if it sustained a damage;
but the bottom storey is too old a part of the business, it is ancient
history; and the worker will not put a further touch to it, even though
it be in serious danger.

For the rest, the present and the following storeys will all have
the same fate. Carefully watched by the insect as long as they are in
process of building, they are forgotten and allowed to go to ruin once
they are actually built. Here is a striking instance: in a cell which
has attained its full height, I make a window, almost as large as the
natural opening, and place it