64 * BEES 



from it than when you are only a few yards. Bees, 

 like us human insects, have little faith in the near at 

 hand ; tkey expect to make their fortune in a distant 

 field, they are lured by the remote and the difficult, 

 and hence overlook the flower and the sweet at their 

 very door. On several occasions I have unwittingly- 

 set my box within a few paces of a bee-tree and 

 waited long for bees without getting them, when, ou 

 fferaoving to a distant field or opening in the woods 

 I have got a clew at once. 



1 have a theory that when bees leave the hive, 

 Unless there is some special attraction in some other 

 direction, they generally go against the wind. They 

 would thus have the wind with them when they 

 returned home heavily l?den, and with these little 

 navigators the difference is an important one. With 

 a full cargo, a stiff head-wind is a great hindrance, 

 but fresh and empty-handed they can face it with 

 more ease. Virgil says bees bear gravel stones a& 

 ballast, but their only ballast is their honey bag. 

 Hence, when I go bee-hunting, I prefer to get to 

 windward of the woods in which the swarm is sup- 

 posed to have taken refuge. 



Bees, like the milkman, like to be near a springo 

 They do water their honey, especially in a dry time. 

 The liquid is then of course thicker and sweeter, and 

 will bear diluting. Hence, old bee-hunters look for 

 bee trees along creeks and near spring runs in the 

 woods, I once found a tree a long distance from 

 any water, and the honey had a peculiar bitter flavor 

 imparted to it, I was convinced, by rain water sucked 

 from the decayed and spongy hemlock tree, in which 

 the swarm was found. In cutting into the tree, the 

 north side of it was found to be saturated with wate" 



