The Life of the Bee 



flowers, the guard at the entrance will 

 abandon their post ; and foreign marau- 

 ders, all the parasites of honey, forever 

 on the watch for opportunities of plunder, 

 will freely enter and leave without any 

 one giving a thought to the defence of 

 the treasure that has been so laboriously 

 gathered. And poverty, little by little, 

 will steal into the city ; the population 

 will dwindle ; and the wretched inhabitants 

 soon will perish of distress and despair, 

 though every flower of summer burst 

 into bloom before them. 



But let the queen be restored before 

 her loss has become an accomplished, 

 irremediable fact, before the bees have 

 grown too profoundly demoralised, — for 

 in this they resemble men : a prolonged 

 regret, or misfortune, will impair their 

 intellect and degrade their character, — let 

 her be restored but a few hours later, and 

 they will receive her with extraordinary, 

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