52 THE LORE OF THE HONEY-BEE 



of shady, unpremeditated corners ; and steeped 

 themselves in mediaevalism up to the eyes. The 

 very song of the bees seemed to belong entirely 

 to past days. None, surely, but a hopeless Vandal 

 could put a colony of bees in one of the ugly 

 square hives, and expect them to go honey-seeking 

 in the old harmonious, happy way, sanctified of 

 the ages. And so they never ventured up the hill 

 to the great bee-farm, but kept to the garden 

 below, and listened by the hour together to the 

 quaint talk of its white-headed, smock-frocked 

 owner, or stood valiantly at the foot of the ladder 

 when he climbed up to dislodge a swarm from the 

 moss-grown apple-boughs, or helped him to scour 

 the new straw skeps with handfuls of mint and 

 lavender, or beat out weird, unskilful music with 

 the door-key on the old brass-pan when a swarm 

 was high in the air. 



Much could be learnt, it is true, from quiet 

 days spent in the old bee-garden, especially in 

 May, before the earliest swarms were ready to 

 forsake the hives. 



The first faculty to be acquired was that of 

 wandering among the bees, or standing between 

 their straw houses, undismayed at their incessant 

 and often terrifying approaches. Whatever con- 

 fidence one may place in bee-keepers' assertions 

 that their bees never sting, it is a bold man who 

 can preserve entire equanimity when bees are 

 settling continuously on his hands, his face, his 



