A YEAR IN THE FIELDS 



swarming with honey-bees. They were so 

 eager for it that they crawled under the 

 leaves and the moss to get at the blossoms, 

 and refused on the instant the hive-honey 

 which I happened to have with me, and 

 which I offered them. I had had this flower 

 under observation more than twenty years, 

 and had never before seen it visited by 

 honey-bees. The same season I saw them 

 for the first time working upon the flower 

 of bloodroot and of adder's-tongue. Hence 

 I would not undertake to say again what 

 flowers bees do not work upon. Virgil im- 

 plies that they work upon the violet, and 

 for aught I know they may. I have seen 

 them very busy on the blossoms of the 

 white oak, though this is not considered a 

 honey or pollen yielding tree. From the 

 smooth sumac they reap a harvest in mid- 

 summer, and in March they get a good 

 grist of pollen from the skunk-cabbage. 



I presume, however, it would be safe to 

 say that there is a species of smilax with an 

 unsavory name that the bee does not visit, 

 herbacea. The production of this plant is 

 a curious freak of nature. I find it growing 

 along the fences where one would look for 

 wild roses or the sweetbrier ; its recurving 

 214 



