80 BEES. 
dirt nor water. The house was situated on a steep 
side-hill. Behind it the ground rose, for a hundred 
rods or so, at an angle of nearly forty-five degrees, 
and the prospect of having to chase them up this hill, 
if chase them we should, promised a good trial of 
wind at least; for it soon became evident that their 
course lay in this direction. Determined to have a 
hand, or rather a foot, in the chase, I threw off my 
coat and hurried on, before the swarm was yet fairly 
organized and under way. The route soon led me 
into a field of standing rye, every spear of which 
held its head above my own. Plunging recklessly 
forward, my course marked to those watching from 
below by the agitated and wriggling grain, I emerged 
from the miniature forest just in time to see the run- 
aways disappearing over the top of the hill, some 
fifty rods in advance of me. Lining them as well as 
I could, I soon reached the hill-top, my breath ut- 
terly gone and the perspiration streaming from every 
pore of my skin. On the other side the country 
opened deep and wide. A large valley swept around 
to the north, heavily wooded at its head and on its 
sides. It became evident at once that the bees had 
made good their escape, and that whether they had 
stopped on one side of the valley or the other, or 
had indeed cleared the opposite mountain and gone 
into some unknown forest beyond, was entirely prob- 
lematical. I turned back, therefore, thinking of the 
honey-laden tree that some of these forests would 
hold before the falling of the leaf. 
I heard of a-youth in the neighborhood, more 
lucky than myself on a like occasion. It seems that 
he had got well in advance of the swarm, whose 
route lay over a hill, as in my case, and as he neared 
. ss 
