194 APID^ — BEES. 



catch as speedily as possible another Bee, and make it sting 

 on the same spot.- 



It is generally believed among our boys that if the part 

 stung by a Bee be rubbed with the leaves of three different 

 plants at the same time, the pain will be relieved. 



Willsford, in his Nature's Secrets, p. 134, says: "Bees, 

 in fair weather, not wandering far from their hives, presage 

 the approach of some stormy weather. . . . Wasps, Hornets, 

 and Gnats, biting more eagerly than they used to do, is a 

 sign of rainy weather.'" 



The prognostication drawn from a flight of Bees, in which 

 there is doubtless much truth, appears from the following 

 lines to have been known to Virgil : 



Nor dare they stay, 

 When rain is promised, or a stormy day : 

 But near the city walls their watering take. 

 Nor forage far, but short excursions make.^ 



Bees were employed as the symbol of Epeses; they are 

 common also on coins of Elyrus, Julis, and Prassus.'^ 



One of the most remarkable facts in the history of Bees 

 is that passage in the Bible^ about the swarm of these in- 

 sects and honey in the carcass of the lion slain by Samson* 

 Some look upon it as a paradox, others as altogether in- 

 credible ; but it admits of easy explanation. The lion had 

 been dead some little time before the Bees had taken up 

 their abode in the carcass, for it is expressly stated that 

 "after a time," Samson returned and saw the Bees and 

 honey in the carcass, so that "if," as Oedman has well ob- 

 served, "any one here represents to himself a corrupt and 

 putrid carcass, the occurrence ceases to have any true simili- 

 tude, for it is well known in these countries, at certain sea- 

 sons of the year, the heat will in twenty-four hours so com- 

 pletely dry up the moistnre of dead animals, and that with- 

 out their undergoing decomposition, that their bodies long 

 remain, like mummies, unaltered, and entirely free from 

 offensive odor." To the foregoing quotation we may add 

 that very probably the larvae of flies, ants, and other insects, 



1 Langstroth on the IIoney-Bee, p. 316, note. 



2 Brand's Pop. An tig., iii. 225. 



^ Georg., iv. 280-4; Dry den's Trans. 

 * Fosb. Encycl. of Antiq., ii. 738. 

 5 Judg. xiv. 8. 



