186 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Mrs. B. flew to the rescue of her cat, 

 and the cat flew at her. 



So did the bees. 



Oue of them drove his drill into her 

 nose, another vaccinated her on the chin, 

 while another began to lay his work near 

 her eye. 



Then she howled and began to act al- 

 most as bad as the cat. 



It was quite an animated scene. 



She cried murder, and the neighbors 

 looked out from their back windows and 

 cried out " Police! " and asked where the 

 fire was. 



This being a trifle too much, I threw a 

 towel over my head, and rushed to her res- 

 cue. 



In doing so, I ran over and knocked her 

 down, trod upon the cat and made mat- 

 ters no better. 



Mrs. B. is no child in a wrestle, and she 

 soon had me under her, and was tenderly 

 stamping down the garden walk with my 

 head, using my ears for handles. 



Then I yelled and some more bees came 

 to her assistance and stung me all over the 

 face. 



She was still giving me darb}^ under 

 the impression that I was the cause of all 

 her pain. 



It was love among the roses, or some- 

 thing of that nature. 



In the meantime, the neighbors were 

 shouting and getting awfully excited over 

 the show, M'hile our servant, supposing us 

 fighting, opened tlie street door and ad- 

 mitted a policeman, who at once proceed- 

 ed to go between man and wife. 



The bees hadn't got to Mrs. B.'s tongue 

 yet, and she proceeded to show the po- 

 liceman that I had abused her in the 

 most shameful manner, and that I had 

 bought a hive of bees on purjoose to tor- 

 ment her into the grave. 



I tried to explain, but just then a bee 

 stung the officer on the nose, and he un- 

 derstood it all in less than a minute. 



He got mad; actually lost his temper. 



He i-ubbed his nose and did some offi- 

 cial swearing. But as this didn't help 

 matters, he drew his staft' and proceeded 

 to demolish the patent bee-hive. 



The bees failed to notice his badge of 

 ofiice, and swarmed on him. 



They stuug him wherever he had no 

 clothing, and some places where he did 

 have it. 



Tlien he howled and commenced acting 

 after the manner of the cat and its mis- 

 tress. He rolled on the ground for a 

 moment, and tlien got up and made a 

 straiglit line for the street, shouting fire. 



Then the bees turned to the people who 

 had climbed upon the fence to see the 

 fun. 



The excitement increased. 



Windows went dowji., and some of the 

 neighbors acted as tliough they thought a 

 twenty-inch shell was about to" explode. 



By this time a fire engine had arrived, 

 and a line of hose was taken through the 

 house into the garden. 



One of tlie firemen asked where the 

 fire was, but just then one of those honey 

 mosquitoes bit him behind the ear and he 

 knew directly. 



TJiey turned a stream upon the half- 

 ruined bee-hive and began to " play 

 aM'ay " with one hand, while they fought 

 the bees with the other. But the water 

 had the desired effect, and those bees 

 were soon among the things that were. 



A terrible crowd had gathered in the 

 meantime in front of the house, but a 

 large portion of it followed the flying 

 policeman, who was rubbing his affected 

 parts and making straight for the station 

 house and a surgeon. 



This little adventure somehow damp- 

 ened our enthusiasm regarding the fe- 

 licity of raising our own honey. 



During the next week we wore bread 

 and milk poultices pretty ardently, but 

 not a word was said about honey, and 

 now Mrs. B. has gone to stay a week with 

 her mother, leaving me and the convales- 

 cent Tom cat, and the tickled neighbors, 

 to enjoy our own felicity, but not with 

 bees — oh, no! J. B. 



Queen Bees. 



Means for raising queens are to be 

 found in hives throughout the greater 

 part of the year, and this is a wise and 

 most beneficent provision against acci- 

 dent or sudden death to the important 

 personage on whose life the welfare of 

 the bee community depends, for as soon 

 as the absence of the common mother is 

 discovered, proceedings are at once insti- 

 tuted for supplying her place. By com- 

 mon consent, certain larvae are fixed 

 upon for royal honors, and around them 

 are built large cradles with thick walls of 

 wax. But these cradles do not take a hor- 

 izontal position, like common bee cells — 

 they jiroject from the combs, and hang 

 perpendicularly, with their mouths down- 

 wards. When made on the face of the 

 combs, all other cells around them are 

 destroyed; but where natural swarming 

 is allowed, they are generally suspended 

 like stalactites from the edges. Now this 

 mode of rearing royalty — so different 

 from the method employed in raising 

 workers — has caused considerable specula- 

 tion, and the question has been asked — 

 why are queens placed in suspended cells, 

 and made, as it were, to stand on their 

 heads? and for what purpose are their 

 cells loaded with far more jelly tlian they 

 can consume? I have not the least idea 

 why, M'rote a Haddington bee-master a 

 few weeks ago. 



We think a reason can be given. In 

 the first place, there is not room for large 



