PEIMAEY SWARM. 215 



trees and bushes are often covered almost as quickly with 

 anxious explorers, as with drops of rain after a copious 

 shower. If she cannot be found, they commonly return to 

 the old hive, in from five to fifteen minutes. 



413. The ringing of bells and beating of kettles and fry- 

 ing-pans to cause swarms to settle, is probably not a whit 

 more efQeacious, than the hideous noises of some savage tribes, 

 who, imagining that the sun, in an eclipse, has been swallowed 

 by an enormous dragon, resort to such means to compel his 

 snakeship to disgorge their favorite luminary. 



Many who have never practiced "tanging," have never had 

 a swarm leave without settling. Still, as one of the "country 

 sounds," and as a relic of the olden-times, even the most 

 matter-of-fact bee-man can readily excuse the enthusiasm of 

 that pleasant writer in the London Quarterly Bevieto, who dis- 

 courses as follows: 



' ' Some fine, warm morning in May or June, the whole atmos- 

 phere seems alive with thousands of bees, whirling and buzzing, 

 passing and repassing, wheeling about in rapid circles, like a 

 group of maddened bacchanals. Out runs the good housewife, 

 with frying-pan and key — the orthodox instruments for ringing 

 — and never ceases her rough music, till the bees have settled. 

 This custom, as old as the birth of Jupiter, is one of the most 

 pleasing and exciting of the countryman's life; and there is an 

 old colored print of bee-ringing still occasionally met with on 

 the walls of a country-inn, that has charms for us, and makes 

 us think of bright, sunny weather in the dreariest November 

 day. Whether, as Aristotle says, it affects them through pleas- 

 ure or fear, or whether, indeed, they hear it at all, is still as 

 uncertain as that philosopher left it; but we can wish no bet- 

 ter luck to every bee-master that neglects the tradition, than 

 that he may lose every swarm for which he omits to raise this 

 time-honored concert. ' ' 



414-. The queen sometimes alights first, and sometimes 

 joins the cluster after it has begun to form. The bees do 

 not usually settle, unless she is with them; and when they 

 do, and then disperse, it is frequently the ease that, after 



