178 ROUGHING IT IN SOUTHERN INDIA 



to ascertain who was, and who was not gifted with the like 

 immunity. No hardship or cruelty was involved in these 

 trials, as no one was obliged to enter the lists. The office 

 was to be well paid, and the men were willing to have a try, 

 the accidents that occurred before the final settlement 

 being salved with a few annas. 



F. had not always been immune himself. When he first 

 took to meddling with bees he used to be badly stung, but 

 bore it and persisted, so that in course of time his system 

 became so used to the formic acid as to be unaffected by 

 it. Some people never feel any effects at all, and in the end 

 he got to be like them, lapse of years even making no 

 difference. The same acid is present in ants. 



Soon after the apiary was made a friend came to stay 

 with us who took an intelligent interest in all we had to 

 show, and who, though not long out from home, pleased us 

 the more as a guest that she was not over-fussy about 

 snakes, as most new-comers are apt to be, so she was invited 

 to come down into the garden and have a look at the apiary, 

 now in exhibition trim. 



As we were walking thither she said to me that she 

 wondered we ' wanted to keep things like that when there 

 were so many wild ones ' ; besides, she thought it was 

 ' rather cruel, if they could see and hear others round them 

 free. 5 F. was ahead of us, and if he heard her remarks he 

 took no notice. Presently we came to the enclosure, which 

 was coarsely gravelled to discourage snakes from attempt- 

 ing to get at the honey, thus scaring the bees, and incidentally 

 getting infinite damage themselves from their stings. Here 

 stood in orderly row five or six hives, their doorways dark 

 with bees, and the air thick with the numbers that circled 

 all around — we two keeping out of range, and F. acting as 

 showman inside the enclosure. Looking at them straight 

 in front of her, ' I don't see any,' said our friend ; and upon 

 my husband's asking her what she had expected to see, 



