The Life of the Bee. 
shade of the hive. It is not chance that 
controls them, but a wisdom whose deep 
loyalty, gravity, and unsleeping watch- 
fulness man alone can betray: a wisdom 
that makes and unmakes, and keeps careful 
watch over all that happens within and 
without the city. If sudden flowers 
abdund, or the queen grow old, or less 
fruitful; if population increase, and be 
pressed for room, you then shall find 
that the bees will proceed to rear royal 
cells. But these cells may be destroyed 
if the harvest fail, or the hive be en- 
larged. Often they will be retained so 
long as the young queen have not ac- 
complished, or succeeded in, her marriage 
flight, —to be at once annihilated when 
she returns, trailing behind her, trophy- 
wise, the infallible sign of her impregna- 
tion. Who shall say where the wisdom 
resides that can thus balance present and 
future, and prefer what is not yet visible 
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