54 BEES. 



honey which she deposited, and then rushed off again 

 like mad. Apple-blossom honey in October ! Fee, 

 fi, fo, fum ! I smell something ! Let 's after." 



In about half an hour we have three well-defined 

 ,'ines of bees established — two to farm-houses and 

 one to the woods, and our box is being rapidly de= 

 pleted of its honey. About every fourth bee goes to 

 the woods, and now that they have learned the way 

 thoroughly they do not make the long preliminary 

 whirl above the box, but start directly from it. The 

 woods are rough and dense and the hill steep, and we 

 do not like to follow the line of bees until we have 

 tried at least to settle the problem as to the distance 

 they go into the woods — whether the tree is on this 

 side of the ridge or in the depth of the forest on 

 the other side. So we shut up the box when it is 

 full of bees and carry it about three hundred yard? 

 along the wall from which we are operating. When 

 liberated, the bees, as they always will in such cases, 

 go off in the same directions they have been going; 

 they do not seem to know that they have been moved. 

 But other bees have followed our scent, and it is not 

 many minutes before a second line to the woods is 

 established. This is called cross-lining the bees. The 

 new line makes a sharp angle with the other line* 

 and we know at once that the tree is only a few 

 rods into the woods. The two lines we have estab- 

 jlished form two sides of a triangle of which the wall 

 Is the base ; at the apex of the triangle, or where the 

 two lines meet in the woods, we are sure to find the 

 tree. We quickly follow up these lines, and where 

 they cross each other on the side of the hill we scan 

 ©very tree closely. I pause at the foot of an oak 

 and examine a hole near the root ; now the bees are 



