CHAPTER XII 
THE QUEEN BEE: IN ROMANCE 
AND REALITY 
“ (\UEENS?”’ said the Bee-Master of Warrilow, 
as he filled his pipe with the blackest and 
strongest tobacco I had ever set eyes on; “‘ queens? 
There are hundreds of hives here, as you can see; 
and there isn’t a queen in any one of them.”’ 
He drew at the pipe until he had coaxed it into 
full blast, and the smoke went drifting idly away 
through the still April sunshine. We were in the 
very midst of the bee-garden, sitting side by side on 
the honey-barrow after a long morning’s work 
among the hives; and the old bee-man had lapsed 
into his usual contemplative mood. 
“°?Tis a pretty idea,’ he went on, ‘‘ this of 
royalty, and a realm of dutiful subjects, and all the 
rest of it, in bee-life. But experience in apiculture, 
as with most things of this world, does away with 
a good many fine and fanciful notions. Now, the 
mother-bee in a hive, whatever else you might call 
her, is certainly not a queen, in the sense of ruling 
over the other bees in the colony. The truth is she 
has little or nothing to do with the direction of 
affairs. All the thinking and contriving is done by 
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