XIX. 
SOME ODD NOTIONS ABOUT BEES. 
EOPLE used to think the 
queen-bee was a king, and 
ruled over all the bees in the hive. 
They thought a hive of bees was 
RQ. 2 little kingdom, with an army, and 
yo officers, and all sorts of workers. 
puck When you get old enough to read 
Shakespeare’s “Henry V.,” you will find in 
it a pretty story about the bees. He says, 
“They have a king, and officers of sorts;” 
and tells how some of the bees act as 
magistrates at home, while others go abroad 
to trade like merchants, and still others 
are armed soldiers. Some, he tells us, are 
masons, and do the building, others make 
the bread and honey, yet others are porters 
155 
