THE HONEY-FLOW 205 



Ours is not a first-rate honey district. In fact, 

 from one cause and another, this is the only honey-flow 

 we have had this season. Happier bee-keepers look 

 forward to opening the year with fruit blossom in 

 May, and to our mind there is not a more delicious 

 honey than that of the apple blossom. When our 

 pear blossom was open, cold weather fell and high 

 winds came, and blew the petals off before the bees 

 could take toll. Then came the hawthorn, and with 

 its opening another unpropitious time, and the bees 

 have had to get a laborious living from colt's-foot, 

 buttercup, and all sorts of miscellanies. It has been 

 well noted that the hive-bee, unlike its wild relatives, 

 when it goes out to forage, continues on the flower it 

 first selected. It is a labour-saving trick. Once you 

 have got the exact knack of a clover blossom, you 

 can go from one to another at increasing speed, land- 

 ing at the same place, extending the tongue at the 

 same moment to the same length, mechanically and 

 easily, as a cotton-girl tends a spindle. It pays the 

 bee, and pays the flower, because by this means there 

 is not all that mixing of foreign pollen that the 

 humble-bees and others make in their random, happy- 

 go-lucky fashion. But the hive-bee, like any one 

 else, can adapt herself to circumstances. When 

 flowers of a kind are few and far between, it takes 

 less time to try the blossoms as they come than to 

 give strict attention to their botanical affinity. In 

 the very early spring you will see bees going from 

 crocus to Christmas-rose, and even thence to the 

 cold snowdrop, glad to get specks of nectar wher- 

 ever they can be found. And in suburban gardens 

 their attentions are sometimes thus miscellaneous 



