July 15, 1911 



looked long with misgivings on a citizen- 

 ship that was gained with so little knowl- 

 edge of what citizenshi}) means, and with 

 no guarantee of responsibiUty toward the 

 duties of citizenship. An almost unre- 

 stricted suffrage is the great problem that 

 confronts us to-day. 



That masses of ignorant foreigners are emp- 

 tied out of political sacks upon our poor long- 

 suffering polls in numbers that seem likely 

 to smother both patriotism and honesty, is 

 certainly not to the credit of our laws nor 

 our law-makers; and yet the equal suffra- 

 gists, among whom I have many friends, 

 tell me they wish a vote quite as unrestrict- 

 ed as the present one. The only argument 

 they make is that, since ignorant men vote. 

 why should not ignorant women vote? In 

 other words, the men have made a great 

 mistake in managing our country, therefore 

 let us multiply it by two. Xew, a bee citi- 

 zen would not for a moment be led away by 

 an argument like this. She is not interest- 

 ed in any thing but the good of her com- 

 munity. The privileges of her sex that 

 would endanger her commune she would 

 scorn. She is a patriot and a citizen, first 

 and always. I wish that the equal suffra- 

 gists would become sympathetic and en- 

 thusiastic bee-keei^ers. I do not know of 

 any other training that would so benefit 

 them or fit them for the duties of citizen- 

 ship. 



In the bee commune there is no voting 

 nor any blanket ballots, nor any corrupted 

 ballot-boxes. Why? Because a bee elects 

 herself to office as soon as she sees that a 

 thing needs to be done. If we all knew as 

 well as the bee does what is good for our na- 

 tion, and if we should do it with such en- 

 thusiasm and unselfishness as characterizes 

 her acts, we should have the millenium, 

 and governments would be done away with 

 as entirely superfluous encumbrances. 



When it comes to the home industries, 

 the bee is again a model. She is always a 

 good housekeeper. She sees that the hive is 

 kept clean, that being one of her first duties. 

 There is another one of her house-keeping 

 qualities which I am sure if we should 

 adopt would go far toward solving the serv- 

 ant question. She knows how to do a part 

 of a piece of work, and then trust it to her 

 sisters to finish. She does not feel that she 

 must stand by and boss the job to the end. 

 She does her own part of it just as well as 

 she knows how, and she expects the others 

 to finish it in a like manner. She does not 

 insist that her own notions be followed in 

 the smallest particulars. She comes in 

 some day with a load of wax, and begins 

 making comb. She puts a piece in place, 

 molds it, makes it properly six-sided for a 

 little space, and then what does she do? 

 Does she stand off and look at the next sis- 

 ter that comes with wax? Does she tell 

 her, "Now put that right here, for this is 

 where I left off"? or, "be careful! you are 

 not getting it straight" ? Xo, indeed. She 

 knows that responsibility is the best teacher; 

 n.l if that will not develop the right kind 



425 



of industry, then nothing can. When the 

 woman in charge of the home demands of 

 her servants results, and does not stand 

 over them, nagging them to make them do 

 their work in her own way, she will then 

 have taken a step further forward in solv- 

 ing the almost unsolvable problem of do- 

 mestic help. 



The bee is an excellent stepmother or 

 nurse, or whatever you may choose to call 

 her in this particular office. She attends to 

 the bee babies with great skill and care, al- 

 though perhaps the ant is her superior in 

 this respect. But she feeds the young on 

 the best kind of food, preparing it for them 

 according to their age and needs. She 

 keeps them clean, carefully watches their de- 

 velopment, and when the time comes she 

 caps their cradles. Although they are not 

 children of her own, she knows how to make 

 them comfortable; and her instincts seem 

 to be quite on a par with the mother in- 

 stinct of which we, as human beings, are so 

 proud in our own race. 



Then I should like to say one word about 

 the bee as an artist. The ancients and also 

 the great mathematicians of all ages have 

 written poems and treatises on the building 

 and the perfection of honey-comb. I never 

 take a piece of this excpiisite structure in my 

 hand without admiring it; yet there are 

 those those who dare to assert that this per- 

 fection of structure occurred by chance! 

 They dare to say that reasonably perfect, al- 

 ternating, rhombic pyramids, which form 

 the base of honey-comb, are fortuitous. It 

 may be that the angles of the cells are not 

 always exactly perfect; but this proves 

 nothing against the mathematical prowess 

 of the worker bee. It simply proves that 

 she is a practical builder. She is working 

 for the good of her colony, and is not willing 

 to sacrifice every thing for the sake of math- 

 ematical precision; and in every case she 

 has proven better than any other creature, 

 excepting man, that economy of storage 

 room for liquid contents, building materi- 

 als, and mathematical formulye may coin- 

 cide. In fact, she has demonstrated in a 

 beautiful way how fundamental and how 

 divine is mathematics. It always touches 

 my imagination that this little winged crea- 

 ture has such a sense of symmetry and 

 beauty. And then her love of color — but 

 that is another story which I have not time 

 to speak of to-day, but which any one may 

 read for himself who will follow the bees 

 about the garden. 



The bee must also have some worthy ob- 

 ject in life outside of herself. She could 

 never be content to gather nectar simply 

 for her own food; she could never waste her 

 days preening her own dress, nor spend her 

 afternoons playing bridge. As soon as she 

 finds she has nothing to live for outside of 

 herself and her own personal interests she 

 lies down and dies. It is surely enough to 

 touch the heart to witness the immediate 

 change in the attitude of a queenless colony 

 when a frame or two of brood are given 

 them. Their buzz has an entirely different 



