THE BEES' DAY 



four or five Dutch thin Boxes, and with a Nail (or 

 Bodkin) making Holes in the Covers, to give them 

 air, have gone and fill'd these Boxes with dead Bees, 

 and put them in my Breeches pockets (that of the 

 Coat or Waistcoat is not warm enough), and so let 

 them remain Half an Hour or more ; and then, 

 opening the Boxes in the Garden, they have all gone 

 home as before." Once, he tells us, he restored to 

 life a whole hive of dead bees by putting them on 

 plates in the bright sunshine. When they were alive 

 again he fed them on honey, and they recovered 

 strength. These bees had perished from hunger, 

 not cold. 



The old bee books are delightful. The best 

 I have read is "The Female Monarchy," by the 

 Rev. Charles Butler, of Basingstoke. This little 

 volume is now extremely rare, and I have never 

 been lucky enough to find a cheap copy of it in an 

 old book-shop. Butler was earlier than Warder, 

 who dedicated with the usual flowers of speech to 

 Queen Anne. He is the more charming writer of 

 the two. I have pictured him moving benign among 

 his bees, coaxing them from their wrath, with never 

 a hasty or nervous movement. Hence his book has 

 the very atmosphere of the bee garden more than 

 any I know of save Maeterlinck's. Maeterlinck 

 does not refer to Butler in some remarks he makes 

 on the English writers on bees. " The Female 

 Monarchy," indeed, is little known even by readers 

 of bee books. 



Warder, though he believes dead bees can be 



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