WHAT THE BEE DOKS. 30! 
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movements. The shrine which it had closed against the winds, and 
the inquisitive glance, it opens to the beloved i 
bee, which, impregnated by it, speeds afar on 
her message of love. The delicious precau- 
tions which Nature has taken to veil from 
profane eyes the mysteries enacted therein, 
do not delay for a moment the audacious 
seeker, who is completely at home, so to 
speak, and has no fear of being considered 
an intruder. One flower, for example, 1s 
protected by a couple of petals which join 
together in the form of an arch (as, for in- 
stance, the iris on the border of the waters, 
which in this manner defends from the rain 
its delicate little lovers). Another, like the 
sweet-pea, dons a kind of helmet, whose vizor 
{ 
must be lifted by its suitor. 
The bee takes its stand at the bottom of 
these recesses worthy of the fairies, covered 
with the softest tapestry, under fantastic 
pavilions, with walls of topaz, and roofs of 
sapphire. Paltry comparisons these, for they 
are borrowed from dead gems, while the 
tlowers live, and feel, and desire, and wait. 
And if the happy conqueror of the little 
hidden kingdoms,—if the imperious violator 
of their innocent barriers, the insect, mingles 
and confuses everything, they readily whisper 
its pardon, overwhelm it with their sweet- 
nesses, and load it with their honey. 
There are favoured localities, and there 
are happy hours, where and when the bee, 
(yr 
. O c 5 JIS SSSS 
while gathering its harvest, accomplishes—  *~~< 
chaste toiler !—myriads of marriages. On the coasts, for example, and 
in the immediate neighbourhood of the savage sea, where one would 
20 
