BEES. 



naturalist, united to tlie fancy of a poet, and the wisdom ot 

 a philosopher : — 



" So work the honey-bees, 

 Creatures that by a rule in nature teach 

 The art of order to a peopled kingdom. 

 They have a king, and officers of sorts, 

 Where some, like magistrates, correct at home. 

 Others, like merchants, venture trade abroad. 

 Others, hke soldiers, armed in their stings, 

 Make boot upon the summer's velvet buds ; 

 Which pillage they with merry march bring home 

 To the tent royal of their emperor : 

 Who, busied in his majesties, surveys 

 The singing masons building roofs of gold ; 

 The civil citizen kneading up the honey ; 

 The poor mechanic porters crowding in 

 Their heavy burthens at his narrow gate ; 

 The sad-eyed justice, with his surly hum 

 Delivering o'er to executors' pale 

 The lazy, yawning drone." 



For those who have imbibed a taste for examining- the 

 wonders of nature — who find their leisure hours better em- 

 ployed in searching into the mysteries of creation than in 

 wasting them in frivolous, expensive, or it may be injurious 

 amusements — for those whose minds are attuned to the poetry 

 of nature's book — whose eyes are enabled to see — 



" Sermons in stones, and good in everything," 



even in the nettle, the centipede, the scorpion, the toad 

 (most maligned of animated beings), or even the dreaded 

 cobra, or rattlesnake — there is no more interesting, more 

 fascinating, or more really instructive branch of science than 

 that which treats of the history and habits of insects. More 

 particularly are they adapted for those whose active minds 

 would fain take them to other lands, in order to increase 

 their stock of knowledge, whilst adverse circumstances chain 

 their unwiUing bodies at home. He who desires to see the 

 lion, the elephant, or the giraffe, in the full enjoyment of 

 their natural tastes, engaged in their natural pursuits, and 

 following their natural instincts, must, like Gordon Gumming, 

 the redoubtable lion-hunter, leave his native land, and spend 

 years separated from his fellow men, in the depths of the 

 African forest, or on the wastes of a burning desert. Does 



