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BEEspoke Data 33

Well, we are to keep our eyes open. This was our first lesson ; and now we have heard how kindness and gentleness will help us with bees, as with every other creature of God. And these are two very good things to learn ; but the bees have many other lessons to teach us, and before we go on to speak of other things, we will listen to their pleasant hum, and see if we can make out anything they have to tell us.

I told you just now that a bee flying from flower to flower will never sting you if you leave it alone. Only if you hinder it, tease it, touch it roughly, will it at last get angry. Yes, and so what I think it says in its hum is this : 'Do, pray, mind your own work, and let me attend to mine. I don't want in the least to interfere with you, and only wish myself to be let alone. I have much to do. Pray do not stop me.' And this is a capital lesson, for we all have our work to do ; and whether it is a great or little thing, the way to do it well is to stick to it, and to give it our whole attention. I dare say you often have lessons at school, or things to do at home that you find hard or troublesome. Well, follow the example of the bee, and, while you do not interfere with others in their work, don't let them stop you. Always remember that your task or duty, whatever it is, is of the first importance.

Then I hear something else in the hum of the bee as it passes me so swiftly on its way from the hive to the flower and back again ; I fancy I hear it say,'I am very busy, but at the same time I am very happy.'

It certainly is a very busy bee. Let me give you some idea of what its work is, how busy its little life. In the first place, it works so hard that it does not live long. In spring and summer-time, when there is much honey to be had, and a great deal of work to do, its life is a very short one, perhaps not more than from six to eight weeks. And to show you how this shortness of life is caused by hard work, you must know that a bee born in autumn, at the beginning of September, will live all through the winter, and generally during the first months of spring, that is to say, from six to eight months--as many months, you see, during its winter rest, as it lives weeks in summer, when it is hard at work.

The daily work of a bee in summer is something most remarkable. Go into the garden, when the sun rises early, and you will very soon see the bee come out and begin its day. And when it has found a place--perhaps it found this the day before --where honey, or whatever it wants, is to be had, whether it is far off or near, it begins to go backwards and forwards to the place as fast as it can fly. It has been found out that if the place, where it can get its food, is tolerably near, it will go backwards and forwards as many as eight or ten times in an hour.

Sir John Lubbock, of whose observations you will hear more, has made many experiments about this,and the way he contrived to find out the truth was as follows : In the first place, he got a few of his bees to come to some honey which he put ready for them at no great distance from their hive. He then marked one of the bees with a small spot of red paint, and another with perhaps a spot of blue ; and thus knew his little friends again quite well when they came back for some more of his sweets.

Then he watched them carefully, putting down on paper the exact time when, for instance, his little red-painted friend came to the honey, and how long it was there feeding itself, or gathering its store to take home, and again noting when it flew away, and when it came back. So he watched it all through the day, and for days together, and thus knew at last how many journeys and visits to the honey his little bee made in the course of the day.

Then he did the same with other bees, and so at last by this means could pretty well guess what is generally the daily work of a bee. Sometimes, for one cause or another, his bee did not make so many journeys as at other times, but, generally speaking, its day's work was something as follows :--It would come to the honey very early, at six o'clock, or earlier according to the weather. It would then stay at the honey about two minutes loading itself, and then, flying away, would be gone about six minutes, in which time it went home, unloaded what it carried, and made its way back. Then again, it immediately began to load itself once more, taking about the same time, and going off again as at first.

This would go on hour after hour, so that perhaps it would make nearly one hundred journeys in the day. Is not this a wonderful story of hard and persevering work? And when, at night-time, or on bad, rainy days, the bee was at home, we must not think it was idle. You will hear at a future time of what the bee does at home and at night; but now I only want you to think of the busy bee as you see it flying backwards and forwards, that so you may know something of what it does, and how hard it works. and the reason why, as I told you, the bee's life is not a very long one.

## Chapter 4 The Bee's Busy Life--continued.

There is an old saying that 'it is better to wear out than to rust out,' which means that anything is better than an idle life. 'A thing that wears out, wears out by work, by being used, by fulfilling the purpose for which it was made, as, for instance, a spade, or a plough, or a knife. These wear out after a time by being constantly used, and it is far better that they should thus wear out, than be laid by, and so at last get rusty and useless. They have done their work when worn out, they have been of no use at all if they have only rusted out.

I think the bees must know something of this old saying. Most truly they do not 'rust out,' but 'wear out ;' and if we are at all like the bees our lives will not be lives of idleness. We shall not get rusty for want of work.

I come at morn, when dewdrops bright

Are twinkling on the grasses,

And woo the balmy breeze in flight

That o'er the heather passes.

I come not these little eyes are dim

To every sense of duty ;

We owe a certain debt to Him

Who clad this earth in beauty.

And, therefore, I am never sad,

A burden homeward bringing,

But help to make the summer glad

In my own way of singing.

And thus my little life is fixed

Till tranquilly it closes.'

Chambers' _Journal._

Indeed, as they work unceasingly day after day, doing the same thing, I do not think we ever can hear them say, in bee language, whatever it is, 'Oh, I am tired of all this! It is just the same thing every day! It is so dull to do it again and again!' The cheerful hum we hear, as the bee flies past us, does not, I think, sound at all like such a grumble. Do you think it does? It may be the same thing every day, but it is what the bees have to do, and they do it very cheerfully ; and I am sure of this, that they are never so happy and in such good temper as when they are at work ; and never so cross, as you will find when you keep bees, as when they are obliged to stay at home by the weather being cold or wet. Then they are much more inclined to sting.

Their patience puts me in mind of a well-known patient donkey. At Carishrooke Castle, in the Isle of Wight, where Charles the First was confined as a prisoner in 1647, there is a very deep well, three hundred feet deep, and, in order to draw the water, there is a contrivance of a great wooden wheel, which, when it is turned, draws up the bucket. This wheel is made so large and broad that a donkey stands inside, and turns it by stepping on, as if walking, although, in fact, the poor animal never really advances an inch, for, as it moves, the wheel of course moves from under its feet. What dull work does this seem, always stepping on, but always in the same place! But the donkey, like the bees, is patient. One donkey was known to do it for fifty years, and another for forty years.

## Chapter V

community of bees in a hive.

The next thing to notice, as we see the bees in hundreds going in and out of the same little door, is the fact of their living and working together, and helping one another. They form thus, what is called a community or colony.

In thus living together they are different from most insects and animals. Indeed, but few do the same. We may find in many cases vast numbers of insects living together in the same place, such as swarms of gnats in a damp cellar, or millions of flies filling the air, or coming in great numbers into a house. Or again, amongst birds, we may find thousands of starlings congregated together; or large colonies of rooks, many of them building their nests in the same tree, and then in winter time coming home to roost at night in countless numbers, so that the very air is darkened. But, although they thus congregate together, they do not form a community; they do not work together for a common purpose; they do not feed and take care of each other's young. Each insect looks out for the supply of its own needs. Each pair of birds,--sometimes the hen bird alone,--build their own nest and rear their own young, and have no regard to or interest in others.

But, when we come to look at bees and some other insects, we find a different state of things altogether. We find that everything, even their very lives, depend upon their living in a community or society, all obeying, by instinct, common rules, each one doing its own part in the common work.

'Alike ye labour, and alike repose;

Free as the air, yet in strict order join'd,

Unnumber'd bodies with a single mind.'

Evans.

We see the same, in great measure, in wasps, which live together during summer and autumn, all helping together in the work of the common home. We see the same in ants, which are insects in many respects as wonderful in their habits and instincts as bees.

Here, to illustrate what **I** have said about insects working together for a common purpose, I may relate **a** story told by Sir John 'Lubbock of some wonderful ants which actually make slaves of other ants, and, in order to obtain and bring them into captivity, go out on regular slave-making expeditions.

One day a whole body of these Amazon or slave-making ants was seen making its way, like an army of soldiers, all drawn up in battle array, and without straggling, across some distance of ground, and through a thick hedge, and straight on, until at last they reached the nest which they were intent on robbing. Then for a few minutes there was a fierce battle, but the Amazon s soon got the best of it, and, forcing their way into the nest, were presently seen marching home, but each ant now carrying in triumph, as the spoils of victory, one of those little white things, often called ants' eggs (which however are really insects in a more advanced state), and which in their captors' nest soon would become live ants, and very useful slaves. And so you see instinct taught them to go out with a common purpose, to work together, and to assist one another.

I can tell you, however, a much more pleasant story given by the same author. I may say that in order to observe their habits, he kept a considerable number of nests of ants in his own house in little cases or boxes, made partly of glass, so that he could see all they did.

On one occasion, in one of his nests, there was a poor ant which, on account of being deformed, 'never appeared able to leave the nest.' However, one day, he says,'I found her wandering about in an aimless sort of manner, and apparently not knowing her way at all. After a while she fell in with some specimens of the little yellow ant, who directly attacked her. I at once set myself to separate them, but, owing either to the wound she had received from her enemies, or to my rough, though well-meant handling, or to both, she was evidently much wounded, and lay helpless on the ground. After some time another ant, but from her own nest, came by. She examined the poor sufferer carefully ; then picked her up gently, and carried her away into the nest. It would have been difficult for any one who witnessed this scene to have denied to this ant the possession of humane feelings.'

Again he says, 'At the present time I have two ants perfectly crippled, so that they are quite unable to move, but they have been tended and fed by their companions, the one for five, and the other for four months.'

Sec, then, how they not only live together, but are kind to one another, and help one another.

Beavers, again, amongst animals, are striking examples, in some respects, of the same thing. Their wonderful houses, built with rooms and passages, and made strong and secure with wood, stones, and mud, are made by them for the common purposes of the whole colony. In it they live and, work together.

In the case of bees, this community or society is absolutely necessary. A single bee cannot live by itself. If you were to take a bee, or, we will say, half-a-dozen bees, and put them by themselves into the most comfortable little live possible, they would very soon die. They would have no spirit to work. They would not even care to get food for themselves, although there might be plenty near at hand.

But how different is it when the whole colony is together! Then, by common instinct the bees seem as one united band of hearty, contented workers ; working together for their common wants, helping one another whenever and however they can, each doing its own part, always happily at peace amongst themselves. What a good example do they give us!

THE SONG OF THE BEES.

Flying out, flying in,

Circling the hive with ceaseless din,

Now abroad, now at home,

Busy through wood and field we roam.

Here in the lily cup, there in the clover,

Gather we sweets the meadow over.

Food to our young we carefully take ;

Pollen we bring, and wax we make ;

A band of us shapes each tiny cell,

Another follows, completing it well.

Working all, working ever,

Suffering idlers among us never,

Never pausing to take our ease :

Oh, busy are we, the honey-bees!

Flying out, flying in,

Circling the hive with ceaseless din,

Now abroad, now at home,

Cheery we stay, and gaily we roam,

Never too hurried to greet a brother,

With feelers crossed we talk to each other ;

Never too selfish to share our stores ;

Some seek them abroad, some use them indoors ;

Unitedly guard we our homes from harm,

Stationing scouts to give the alarm.

So, working all, and working with will, Providing in summer for winter chill, Whirring and buzing, nor caring for ease, Oh, cheery are we, the honey-bees!

Flying out, flying in,

Circling the hive with ceaseless din,

Whether abroad, or whether at home,

Loyal we stay, and loyal we roam.

In royal apartments our queen-bee is reigning :

We render our homage unmingled with feigning :

Lowly we bow as we pause by her side,

The choicest of food with her we divide.

Thus working all, and working with heart,

Each striving good to the whole to impart,

Busy and cheery, we think not of ease,

And loyal are we, the honey-bees!

Flying out, flying in,

Circling the hive with ceaseless din,

Whether abroad, or whether at home,

This lesson we teach wherever we roam :

Mortal, like us, go labour unwearily,

Work with thy kind, and work with them cheerily ;

Duty fulfil, wheresoer thou may'st owe it ;

Where honour is fitting, fail not to bestow it ;

It matters not whether at home or abroad,

Be faithful to man and be loyal to God.

Thus work thou well and work thou ever ;

The lessons we teach thee thou may'st not dissever :

Be busy, be cheery, be loyal, for these

Are the truths thou may'st learn from the honey-bees!