260 A BEE-TKAGEDY. 



tamely to the extinction of the royal race ? Yes, and they 

 do more ; for though they themselves lay not a sting on the 

 sacred persons of the young princesses, they aid the cruel 

 queen in the completion of her butchery ; for no sooner does 

 she quit each scene of her successive assassinations, than drag- 

 ging from the chamber the body she has left, they hasten to 

 hide from view the evidence of her jealous fury. 



The scene above depicted reads, it must be owned, exceed- 

 ingly tragic, and with such materials for a " Play upon the 

 Passions," well may Bees have been made to figure as Dramatis 

 Personce, and have had allotted them (to use the words of a 

 modern writer) " a whole play to themselves." Of this play 

 we know nothing, except that it was written in the reign of 

 Elizabeth, who ought to have been the play-writer's patron ; 

 for what could be more harmonious with her ruling passion 

 than the part enacted by the queenly Bee, made, as we presume, 

 his heroine. She, before whom to allude to a successor, was 

 (in her own words) to "pin up her winding-sheet before her 

 face," how would she have borne a rival near her throne? 



However, and as must be by this time pretty evident, the 

 things which would be highly unbecoming among men and 

 women, are exceedingly well-ordered among Bees. It seems 

 quite essential to the welfare of a hive, to acknowledge only one 

 sovereign; but as on this single sovereign, in her capacity of 

 general mother, not only the welfare but the very existence of 

 the state depends ; and, as over and above, no emigration can 



