HAPPY 



returned. Have you ever lived in a house without a 

 Queen-Mother? You do not understand, then, what 

 a terrible thing that is." 



He stopped short and would say no more. 



"Please go on!" I urged. 



"Some day I'll tell you all of it. It is a long story, 

 but for us the end was in sight. In the large economy 

 of the universe our efforts were futile. Better for us 

 and for the great Life of the Bee that the honey we had 

 gathered should be conserved by strange colonies, and 

 that our short lives should be yielded up or dedicated 

 to strengthening them, than that it should be left rich 

 booty to web-worms and mice. So it came to pass, 

 you and others found out our condition and sought our 

 stores, as it has been written you should. We fought 

 at first, half-heartedly as one without friends or kins- 

 men or home will fight. You saw the end of the battle. 

 It is over. And now will you let me go home with you ? 

 You see I have but five legs, but I can still work and 

 help do the things that remain to be done." 



So absorbing had been his story, I quite forgot my- 

 self, and while I answered, "I'm so sorry for you, and 

 want you to come," my thoughts were far away. 



The things he had told me out of his life and out of 

 the life of the colony had gone deep in my breast. 

 Turning from him, I looked around and, lo ! the hive was 

 silent as death. Not a thing of life remained except 

 this poor, miserable, orphaned bee. Death had come, 

 and now stood guard over the portal of the little home 

 where once a beautiful spirit had brooded, and where 

 some of the laws we may not understand had come to 

 fulfilment. . . . 



