26 WESTERN SERIES OF READERS. 



Well, the phoebes are very fond of these big 

 drones. Mother phoebe snatched one as it was 

 booming back to the hive. Any one, even a bird, 

 can tell by the sound when drones are in the air. 

 She brought it to the trellis and banged it against 

 the bar. Then she gave it to a young phoebe. 

 You should have seen the fun! Get yourself a 

 beehive, and you will soon have the phoebes about 

 your place. The little phoebe next to the mother 

 took the drone, and the next young phoebe 

 snatched at the other end of him. Each pulled 

 as hard as it could, and of course the drone came 

 in two somewhere. But the tail of the drone had 

 no sting, and so the fellow that got the head was 

 no better off than its brother, who got the tail. 

 Drones never do have a sting, and that is the 

 reason the mother phoebe likes to feed them to 

 her young ones. And she taught them early to 

 choose the drones, when near the hives. And 

 she was teaching them to sit still and watch. A 

 good lesson for anybody to learn ! 



Phoebe does not catch insects while soaring on 

 the wing, as the swallows and swifts do. She sits 

 on the watch arid makes a dive or lunge through 

 the air, just as the kingfisher sits 011 his perch 

 and dives into the water for fish. 



Sometimes the phoebes see a saw-bug or small 



