A SHARP LOOKOUT. 19 



feminine timidity, and leaves the first rude assaults 

 to them. I knew the honey-bee was very fond of 

 the locust blossoms, and that the trees hummed like 

 a hive in the height of their flowering, but I did 

 not know that the bumble-bee was ever the sapper and 

 miner that went ahead in this enterprise, till one day 

 I placed myself amid the foliage of a locust and saw 

 him savagely bite through the shank of the flower 

 and extract the nectar, followed by a honey-bee that 

 in every instance searched for this opening, and 

 probed long and carefully for the leavings of her 

 burly purveyor. The bumble-bee rifles the dicentra 

 and the columbine of their treasures in the same 

 manner, namely, by slitting their pockets from the 

 outside, and the honey-bee gleans after him, taking 

 the small change he leaves. In the case of the locust, 

 however, she usually obtains the honey without the 

 aid of the larger bee. 



Speaking of the honey-bee reminds me that the 

 subtle and sleight-of-hand manner in which she fills 

 her baskets with pollen and propolis is characteristic 

 of much of Nature's doings. See the bee going from 

 flower to flower with the golden pellets on her thighs, 

 slowly and mysteriously increasing in size. If the 

 miller were to take the toll of the grist he grinds by 

 gathering the particles of flour from his coat and hatj 

 as he moved rapidly about, or catching them in his 

 pockets, he would be doing pretty nearly what the 

 bee does. The little miller dusts herself with the pol- 

 len of the flower, and then, while on the wing, brushes 



