54 LIFE OF SIR JOHN LUBBOCK oh. 



wrote to the man and said : " Now that I have 

 had the bees, for which I am greatly obliged, 

 would you kindly tell me, to satisfy my curiosity, 

 how you are able to procure them at this time 

 of year." The man wrote back quite courteously, 

 but quite firmly, saying : " No, since I can sell 

 the bees at eighteenpence each, I think it pays 

 me better to go on doing so than to tell anybody 

 else how to procure them." So this matter of 

 the humble bees appears to remain a profound 

 mystery even to this day. 



There is a further tragic tale connected with 

 that same handbag which may as well find its 

 place here. A little later one of the younger 

 Lubbock brothers had asked John to bring down 

 some ferrets from London. He duly procured 

 the ferrets, which were in a sack, and put 

 them under the seat in the railway carriage. 

 Then, according to his habit, he became deeply 

 engrossed in a scientific pamphlet, and quite 

 unconscious of his surroundings, until he 

 found his fellow-passengers betraying symptoms 

 of vivid uneasiness. The wretched ferrets had 

 gnawed their way out of the sack, and were in- 

 vestigating the trousers and persons generally of 

 the passengers. With many apologies Lubbock 

 picked them up and inserted them, after a 

 prolonged hunt and capture, in the handbag. 

 The creatures must have been very hungry, 

 for they began work with devouring some 

 scientific papers, and then, finding these to 

 be rather dry eating, betook themselves to 

 the leather of the bag, which they entirely 

 destroyed. The finale of the story is the most 



