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AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



September 



So my good little bees had not con- 

 fined their social activities to the 

 visiting of flowers, and as we passed 

 out we were followed by envious 

 glances. For Herr Professor had ar- 

 rived. The ladies of the Club no 

 longer wondered if he were in Amer- 

 ica to avoid war duty, or had been 

 banished for political reasons. Also 

 they ignored the report that his mar- 

 riage to Frau Clara had been sanc- 

 tioned by neither Church nor State. 

 He had made their piano speak to 

 them in the one universal language. 

 That was enough. 



"On the day before Friday," bee fix- 

 tures, catalogues, magazines and a 

 stack of beeswax were concealed in 

 the basement; the piano was dusted, 

 tuned and garnished with flowers ; a 

 square of honey placed on the best 

 plate, the choicest amber mead set 

 out; and, last of all, our bee uniforms 

 regretfully exchanged for citizen's 

 clothing. No sacrifice of personal 

 comfort was too great in honor of 

 Europe's favorite pianist. 



It was quite late in the afternoon 

 when at last we heard animated con- 

 versation, interspersed by intermit- 

 tent howlings. Soon Frau Clara ap- 

 peared, followed by Herr Professor 

 tenderly carrying a small brown dog. 



"Ve do not like your beans," she 

 began, excitedly. "They vill not let 

 my leetle dog eat. Every day they 

 come and take his dinner — an' meat 

 so exbensive ! He get nothing. He 

 starve. He is sting. He cry." 



"Impossible!" I told her. "Bees 

 don't eat meat." 



"Yellow beans," she insisted. 



"Perhaps it's yellow-jackets," sug- 

 gested the Magic Girl. 



"Of course," I agreed, relieved. I'll 

 show you. They eat bees, too!" 



So I brought from the apiary a 

 fly-trap filled with yellow-jackets 

 that had been captured through the 

 lure of a meat bait, a piece of which 

 still remained in the trap. I also 



Frau Clara in hastily improvised bee costume 

 (Photograph by W. B. Dickinson) 



pointed out a honey-bee which the 

 enemy had dragged in. Then I went 

 out again and tapped gently on the 

 side of a hive as I had seen the birds 

 do at breakfast time. A bee peered 

 inquisitively through the opening. At 

 the second tap it came out and 

 crawled up the front of the hive. , In 

 a second I had the insect by the 

 wings and pinned alongside a yellow- 

 jacket, where even Frau Clara could 

 distinguish, though reluctantly, the 

 carnivorous from the nectarivorous 

 "bean." 



Herr Professor radiated smiles, 

 and, much to the disappointment of 



the Magic Girl, he discarded the 

 promised classics and improvised on 

 the piano the wierd things our beans 

 had done to their dog, while the lat- 

 ter continued to howl its own version 

 of the affair. But only with the 

 serving of the amber mead was Frau 

 Clara fully convinced. She grew con- 

 fidential. It seemed she had always 

 lived in a "beeg city, Vienna," had 

 never owned pets, except "von leetle 

 cheeken," and she would so love to 

 have some beans, for "such good 

 drink" she "nevair" tasted, so much, 

 "what you call? Keek" (kick.) 



It was the next morning that Frau 

 Clara appeared, wraith-like, in my 

 apiary to tell me that their garden 

 was full of beans, and Would I give 

 her a box like mine, "so they go in?" 

 I handed over the hive just prepared 

 for my own use in the artificial 

 swarming project, and, like a true 

 beeman, abandoned work to be in at 

 the hiving. 



Counting the few remaining "Beat 

 (Photo by John R. Douglass) 



When I arrived the bees had been 

 settled in a cluster on the limb of a 

 young fruit tree, presumably by the 

 rhythmic torn torn of the valiant 

 Professor, who still knelt just be- 

 neath, the baby grand having been 

 temporarily replaced with dishpan 

 and hammer, "so like old countree," 

 and his concert attire, apparently for 

 the garb of a hobo. 



The bees were indeed yellow and of 

 a rare, though singularly familiar 

 shade. I examined them more close- 

 ly, then hastened back to my apiary 

 and opened the hive containing the 

 new queen. My suspicions were cor- 

 rect. She was gone, together with 

 most of her subjects, whether 

 swarmed, absconded, abdicated, or 

 merely enticed by the witchery of 

 Herr Professor's music, was of small 

 matter. It was the thought of my 

 finest colony at that moment being 

 made comfortable in my neighbor's 

 garden, and in the very hive I my- 

 self had provided, that rankled, and, 



