Dodge City times. [volume] (Dodge City, Kan.) 1876-1892, 1881-09-01

hunters, who each year visit the district
to get honey and wax.
Much a. has been said and written
concerning bees. think the reader will
yet find something novel in a brief de-
scriptiOn of the wild bees of Timor. and
the old method bv which the natives
capture them. These bees (the apis
dorsdta) do not. like the wild bees of
America and other countries. build their
nests in hollow trees. or clefts in the
crags. was astonished to see hanging
to the lower eide of some stout branch,
far up in the tops Of the loitiest trees, q
great cone OF honey-comb, often four
feet in diameter by five feet in length
These combs are so piled and covered
in as to resist the weather completely,
and are cemented to the branch with n
thick, glutinOus stump of very tough
and compact wax. l estimated the
weight Of some of these large combs at
three hundred pounds.
During the week we were in the for
est. we took. should think, nearly five
hundred Of these horey-cones. The
honey. save what we could eat with our
food, was Of no use to us, and | have
little doubt that thirty or forty thousand
pounds of honey were destroyed BY us
in that one week; for the wax was all
that we cared to take.
The first time l saw the natives take
a bees nest, thought their method Of
doing it as curious rs the nest itself
was odd. This peculiar nest hung from
limb of a tall. straight, smooth barked
eucalyptus tree. seventy-hve feet from
the ground. The trunk of the tree was
a yard or more in diameter. To cut
it down would have been several hours
work. even for an experienced woods
man; while to climb it. afterthe ordinary
fashion. would have been out of the
question. This is the way Benu. one
of the Tim0r men, set to work. First,
he took from his bundle torch Of some
resinous wood. and lighted it. This
torch he attached to his waist cloth, or
girdle. by means of string some ten
feet long. so that as he climbed up. the
slowly burning. but densely smoking,
torch would hang beneath him. To
his girdle was also hung chopping-
knife, for cutting of the comb from the
branch. and q long line, in q coil, for
lowering it to the ground. FOla, an
other of the men. now brought him a
strong bush rope, or creeper, some
twenty feet long. green and pliable.
and freshly cut from thicket. Benu
first passed one end of this creepor
round the trunk of the tree. then grasp
ing an end in each hand. leaned back.
and setting his feet against the trunk,
he began to walk up the tree, holding
fast by the bush rope and throwing it
up, by quick jerk. after every second
step. 1t was wonderful to note the
skill with which he took advantage Of
the least roughesss, or scar in
the bark, to get hold for the
loop. or for his feet. He was not
much more than minute going up sixty
feet. All this time. he was almost en-
velOped in cloud of smoke from the
torch, which seemed to prevent the
bees from settling upon his body;
which, but for his waist-cloth. was en-
tirely bare and exposed to their stings.
Arriving directly beneath the limb to
which the comb was suspended, by a
dexterous spring he threw himself
partly over 1t, then drawing up his
torch. so that its smoke completely en-
veloped his body. he rested for some
moments before creeping out on the
branch to cut off the comb. Thousands
of the bees were flying about him. and
thousands more were clinging in black
masses to the outside of the comb. But
upon Benu's holding out the torch be-
meath it. they all rose in dense cloud
filling the fores: with their deep, solemn
hum. Defended by the smoke, Benu
had in a moment or two more made a
double moose of his smaller line round
the comb; and then, with few def
cuts OF his chopper. he cleaved off the
broken to the ground. In three min