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BEES. 

AN IDYL OF THE HONEY-BEE. 
THERE is no creature with which man has sur- 
rounded himself that seems so much like a product of 
civilization, so much like the result of development 
on special lines and in special fields, as the honey-bee. 
Indeed, a colony of bees, with their neatness and love 
of order, their division of labor, their public spirited- 
ness, their thrift, their complex economies and their 
inordinate love of gain, seems as far removed from a 
condition of rude nature as does a walled city ora 
cathedral town. Our native bee, on the other hand, 
“the burly, dozing bumble-bee,” affects one more like 
the rude, untutored savage. He has learned nothing 
from experience. He lives from hand to mouth. He 
luxuriates in time of plenty, and he starves in times 
of searcity. He lives in a rude nest or in a hole in 
the ground, and in small communities; he builds a 
few deep cells or sacks in which he stores a little honey 
and bee-bread for his young, but as a worker in wax 
he is of the most primitive and awkward. The In- 
dian regarded the honey-bee as an ill-omen. She was 
the white man’s fly. In fact she was the epitome of 
the white man himself. She has the white man’s 
eraftiness, his industry, his architectural skill, his 
 neatness and love of system, his foresight ; and above 
