The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1904-12-03
zow THE BEE SPENDS IT'S TINE.

cDI4Ten-Lney nate TO reel lonely.
"A bee will die of sheer loneliness if
you take it away from its friends.
1t never does any work for itself,
but works only for the sake of the
hive. And bees love their work,
they love the busy stir in their home,
and above all, they love their queen,
who is the mother of them all, and
hardly ever stirs out of the hive.
Fancy being the queen and the
mother of the 10000 busy, buzzing
bees who live in our hive at the bot
tom of the garden!
No queen is more lovingly attend
ed BY her subjects than the queen of
the bees. They would do anything
fof her, but they can do nothing
without her. Day and night she is
surrounded by ring of ladies in
waiEug, who always stand with tf1rir
faces toward her, so that some of
them must walk backward whenever
she moves. She is fed and she is
washed and nothing is ever allowed
to disturb the one work that she is
busy upon day and night-the work
of laying eggs.
If anything should happen to her
all the bees will nearly go off their
heads in their sorrow, and if she
should be ost and her bees can't find
her, all her unhappy children will
soon die of distress.
If any accident happens to the
hive the bees protect their queen and
the young bees with their lives, and
if there should be famine they give
her the last drop of food.
The sentinels who guard the door
of the hive never allows a strange
queen to come in when their mother
is at home.
The queen herself is the busiest of
all in the hive. But she never enjoys
long days of sunshine spent among
the flowers. It is her duty and hel
Joy to keep on laying eggs without
stopping in the darkness of the hive
She lives three or four years SC
that she may do this work properly
but the common bees who have been
born in the spring only live to see
little of one bright summer, six or
eight weeks, perhaps. Those who
are born late in the year live longer,
for they have not to work day and
night, but sleep through the winter.
You can see how eager the bees
are to get on with their work, as
they fly in streams in and out of the
hive, all through the summer days.
If you watched bee as it arrived
at the hive you would see it hurrying
without stopping to talk or play, to
the little cell where the honey it has
gathered must be stored; and then
it would go to empty out the stores
from its leg baskets into other sepa-
rate cells. Each load must be put
away in its proper place; and then
at once out it would fly again to the
sunshine and the flowers to bring
back another load.
WAY BLOCKED BY DRONES.
If you kept a very careful watch
on the busy working bees as they
hurried about in the hive, you would
soon notice that their way was often
blocked by larger bees than them
selves, who never seem to have any
thing to do but to hinder the others.
These larger bees are the grand gen
tlemen of the hive-drones they are
called-and drones they are, for they
never do a stroke of work for them
selves, but simply live lazy life OF
luxury.
In the hive that l am telling you
about there were quite 400 of these
grand gentlemen. They were very
big and fine, and each one had 1900
eyes on each side of his head, which
seemed rather a shame considering
that the poor workers had only 6ooo.
But then the drones had no stings.
All day long the did nothing, but
were fed by the working bees on the
food that they had SO carefully stored
up.
They slept in snug corners, summed
themselves at the hives door, and
perhaps now and then flew out to see
how the world was looking, but nev-
er to do a stroke of work. They
were always treated with respect and
allowed to pass as they pleased into
any hive they cared to visit.
The most important part OF the
nursery, indeed the most important
place in the whole hive, was the
spot where FIVE wonderful cells had
been built, larger than any of the
other cells, looking something like
aoorns. In these special cells were
the grubs of royal bees-beautiful
princesses of the future, who might
some day reign as queens themselves
With hundreds of little bees COM
ing into the world every day, it is
quite easy to see that soon the hive
would be too small to shelter all
the bees. This is what happened In
the hive that l am telling you about
the hive grew too small to hold
all the bees, or rather the bees went
away to find new home, SO that
the old home might be left to the
rising generation.
But, of course, it would never dc
to go away without queen. SC
this is what happened:
From one of the royal cells there
stepped out a beautiful princess. :.
Now, seventeen days before, this
princess had been nothing but ar
egg. The egg had lain in its little
cell for three days, and then a grut
had emerged. For FIVE days this
little grub was fed by the nurse bees
not on the ordinary food that is giver
to little bees, but on food that is KEEP
only for royalty. And then the nurs'
es had covered in the cell with wax
and left the little grub to itself, tC