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THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



A Bee Hunt. 



BY WASHINGTON IKVING. 



The beautiful forest in wliicli we were en- 

 camped abounded in bee-trees; tliat is to say, 

 trees in the decayed trunks of wliich wikl bees 

 had established their hives. It is surprising in 

 what countless swarms the bees have over- 

 spread the Far West within but a moderate 

 number of years. The Indians consider them 

 to be harbingers of the white man, as the buf- 

 falo is of the red man; and say that in propor- 

 tion as the bee advances, the Indian and buffalo 

 retire. We are always accustomed to associate 

 the hum of the bee-hive with the farm-house 

 and flower-garden, and to consider those indus- 

 trious little animals as connected with the busy 

 haunts of man, and I am told that the wild bee 

 is seldom to be met Avith at any great distance 

 from the frontier. They have been the heralds 

 of civilization, steadily preceding it as it ad- 

 vanced from the Atlantic borders, and some of 

 the ancient settlers of the West pretend to give 

 the very j^ear when the honey bee first crossed 

 the Mississippi. The Indians Avith surprise 

 found the mouldering trees of their forests sud- 

 denly teeming with ambrosial sweets, and noth- 

 ing, I am told, can exceed the greedy relish 

 with Avhich they banquet for the first time upon 

 this imbought luxury of the wilderness. 



At present the honey bee swarms in myriads, 

 in the noble groves and forests which skirt and 

 intersect the prairies, and extend along the al- 

 luvial bottoms of the rivers. It seems to me as 

 if these beautiful regions answer literally to the 

 description of the land of promise, "a land 

 flowing Avith milk and honey;" for the rich pas- 

 turage of the prairies is calculated to sustain 

 herds of cattle as countless as the sands upon 

 the sea-shore, Avhile the floAvers Avith Avhich they 

 are enamelled render them a very paradise for 

 the nectar-seeking bee. 



We had not long been in the camp when a 

 party set out in quest of a bee-tree, and being 

 curious to witness the sport, I gladly accepted 

 an invitation to accompany them. The party 

 was headed by a veteran bee hunter, a tall, lank 

 felloAV jn homespun garb that hung loosely about 

 his limbs, and a straw hat shaped not unlike a 

 bee-hive; a comrade, equally uncouth in garb, 

 Avithout a hat, straddled along at his heels, with 

 a long rifle on his shoulder. To these succeed- 

 ed half a dozen others, some with axes and some 

 Avith rifles, for no one stirs far from the camp 

 Avithout his fire-arms,- so as to be ready for either 

 Avild deer or AVJld Indian, 



After proceeding some distance wc came to 

 an open glade on the skirts of the forest. Here 

 our leader halted and then advanced quietly to 

 a loAV bush, on the top of Avhich I perceived a 

 piece of honey comb. This, I found, Ay as the 

 bait or lure for the wild )jees. Seyeral AVere 

 humming about jt, and divjng into its cells. 

 When they had laden themselves >yith honey, 

 they Avould rise into the air, and dart qff in a 

 straight line, almost yfith the velocity of a bul- 

 let. The hunters watched ^.ttejitively "the course 

 they took, and then set ofi' in the same direc- 



tion, stumbling along over twisted roots and 

 fallen trees, Avith their eyes turned up to the 

 sky. In this Avay they traced the honey-laden 

 bees to their hiA^e, in the hollow trunk of a 

 blasted oak, Avhere, after buzzing about for a 

 moment, they entered a hole about sixty feet 

 from the ground. 



Tavo of the bee hunters now plied their axes 

 vigorously at the foot of the tree, to level it Avith 

 the ground. The mere spectators and amateurs, 

 in the meantime, drew off' to a cautious distance, 

 to be out of the way of the falling tree and the 

 vengeance of its inmates. The jarring blows 

 of the axe seemed to have no effect in alarming 

 or disturbing this most industrious community. 

 They continued to ply at their usual occupa- 

 tions, some arriA'ing full freighted into port, 

 others sallying forth on new expeditions, like 

 so many merchant men in a money-making me- 

 tropolis, little suspicious of pending bankruptcy 

 and downfall. Even a loud crack Avhich an- 

 nounced the disrupture of the trunk, failed to 

 divert their attention from the intense pursuit 

 of gain. At length doAvn came the tree with a 

 tremendous crash, bursting ojien from end to 

 end, and displaying all the housed treasures of 

 the commonAVcalth. 



One of the hunters immediately ran up with 

 a Avisp of lighted hay as a defence against the 

 bees. The latter, hoAvever, made no attack and 

 sought no revenge. They seemed stupefied by 

 the catastrophe and unsuspicious of its cause, 

 and remained craAvIing and buzzing about the 

 ruins, Avithout offering us any molestation. Eve- 

 ry one of the party uoav fell to, Avith spoon 

 and hunting knife, to scoop out the flakes of 

 honey comb Avith which the hoUoAV trunk Avas 

 stored. Some of them Avere of old date and a 

 deep brown color, others were beautifully white, 

 and the honey in their cells was almost limpid. 

 Such of the combs as were entire Avere placed 

 in camp kettles to be conveyed to the encamp- 

 ment; those Avhich had been shivered in the 

 fall were devoured upon the spot. Every stark 

 bee hunter Avas to be seen with a rich morsel in 

 his hand, dripping about his fingers, and disap- 

 pearing as rapidly as a cream tart before the 

 holiday appetite of a schoolboy. 



Nor was it the bee hunters alone that profited 

 by the downfall of this industrious community. 

 As if the bees Avould carry through the simili- 

 tude of their habits with those of laborious and 

 gainful man, I beheld numbers from rival hives, 

 arriving on eager wing to enrich themselves 

 with the ruin of their neighbors. These bu- 

 sied themselves as eagerly and cheerfully as so 

 many wreckers on an Indiaman that has been 

 driven on shore; plunging into the cells of the 

 broken honey combs, banqueting greedily on 

 the spoil, and then Avinging their Avay full 

 freighted to their homes. As to the poor pro- 

 prietors of the ruin, they seemed to have no 

 lieart to do anything, not even to taste the nec- 

 tar thatfloAved around them; but craAAded back- 

 wards and forwards, in vacant desolation, as I 

 liaA'e seen a poor fellow with his hands in his 

 pockets, Avhistling vacantly and despoudingly 

 about the ruins of his house that had been 

 burned. 



