THE BEIE. 



that they may well be said to have a commonwealth, since all 

 they do ia in common, without respect to private interest : they 

 work for all, they watch for all, and they fight for all. 



Of all the poets or prose writers that ever took tip pen on 

 behalf of the little wax and honey-maker, not one ever acoom- 

 pHshed his task with such compact beauty and completcnesa 

 as Shakspeare in his play " Henry V. :" — 



" So work the honey bees. 

 Creatures that by a rule in natxire teach 

 The act of order to a peopled kingdom. 

 They have a king and officers of sorts : 

 Where some like magistrates correct at home ; 

 Others like merchants venture trade abroad ; 

 Others like soldiers armbd in their stings, 

 Make boot upon the summer's velvet buds ; 

 Which pillage they with merry march bring home- 

 To the tent royal of their emperor : 

 Who, busied in his majesty, surveys 

 The singing masons building roofs of gold ; 

 The civil citizens kneading up the honey ; 

 The poor mechanic porters crowding in 

 Their heavy burdens at his narrow gate ; 

 The sad-eyed justice, with his surly hum. 

 Delivering o'er to executors pale 

 The lazy, yawning drone." 



At the very outset, the bee question presents a marvellous 

 feature — how are bees generated ? So long ago as the time of 

 Virgil the matter was discussed, and, by the last-mentioned 

 philosopher, thus quaintly accounted for : — " First, there is 

 found a place, small and narrowed, for the very use, shut in by 

 a Httle tUed roof and closed walls, through which the Hght 

 comes in askant by four windows, facing the four points of the 

 compass. Next is found a two-year-old bull-calf, whose crooked 

 horns are just beginning to bud. In spite of his kicking, the 

 nose-holes of the beast are stopped, and after he has been 

 thumped to death, his entraUs, bruised as they are, melt inside 

 his entire skin. This done, he is left in the place afore pre- 

 pared, and under his sides are put bits of boughs and thyme 

 and fresh-plucked rosemary. In time, the warm humour 

 begins to ferment within the soft bones of the carcase, and, 

 wonderful to tell, there appear creatures, footless at first, but 

 which, soon getting unto themselves wings, mingle together 

 and buzz about, joying more and more in the airy life. At 

 last burst they forth, thick as rain-drops from a summer cloud, 



