The Bee-Master of Warrilow. 



blaze. Then he disappeared for a moment, and returned 

 with a dusty cobweb-shrouded bottle, which he carried in 

 a wicker cradle as a butler would bear priceless old wine. 

 The cork came out with a ringing jubilant report, and the 

 pale, straw-coloured liquid foamed into the glasses like 

 champagne. It stilled at once, leaving the whole inner 

 surface of the glass veneered with golden bells. The old 

 beeman held it up critically against the light. 



" The last of 19—," he said, regretfully. " The finest 

 mead year in this part of the country for many a decade 

 back. Most people have never tasted the old Anglo- 

 Saxon drink that King Alfred loved, and probably Harold's 

 men made merry with on the eve of Hastings. So they 

 can't be expected to know that metheglin varies with each 

 season as much as wine from the grape." 



Of the goodness of the liquor there admitted no ques- 

 tion. It had the bouquet of a ripe Ribston pippin, and 

 the potency of East Indian sherry thrice round the Horn. 

 But its flavour entirely eluded all attempt at comparison. 

 There was a suggestive note of fine old perry about it, 

 and a dim reminder of certain almost colourless Rhenish 

 wines, never imported, and only to be encountered in 

 moments of rare and happy chance. Yet neither of these 

 parallels came within a sunbeam's length of the truth 

 about this immaculate honey-vintage of Warrilow. Pon- 

 dering over the liquor thus, the thought came to me that 

 nothing less than a supreme occasion could have war- 

 ranted its production to-day. And this conjecture was 

 immediately verified. The bee-master raised his glass 

 above his head. 



" To the Bees of Warrilow ! " he said, lapsing into the 

 broad Sussex dialect, as he always did when much moved 

 by his theme. " Forty-one years ago to-day the first 

 stock I ever owned was fixed up out there under the old 

 codlin-tree ; and now there are two hundred and twenty 

 of them. 'Twas before you were born, likely as not ; and 

 bee science has seen many changes since then. In those 

 days there were nothing but the old straw skeps, and most 

 bee-keepers knew as little about the inner life of their bees 

 as we do of the bottom of the South Pacific. Now things 

 are very different ; but the improvement is mostly in the 

 bee-keepers themselves. The bees are exactly as thej 

 14 



