250 BEES AND BEE-KEEPING. 



But blossoms are fixed, if not even isolated. How 

 is the all-needful, fertilising dust to be carried from 

 one to the other? For some, the work is done by 

 the wind, as when the blossoming corn is made to 

 gently rustle, or the lightly-suspended catkin of 

 the willow is vibrated in the upper boughs. Pollen, 

 in all such cases, having been formed, in countless mil- 

 lions of granules, is, at its proper season, wafted by 

 every breath of air to the stigmas, made branched and 

 hairy to increase the chance of grasping it as it travels 

 past. But by far the greater number of flowering 

 plants confide to insects the duty of bringing about 

 those unions which, without them, would never be 

 effected. And, amongst insects, the whole family of 

 the Apidas are of the highest utility, followed by 

 butterflies and moths, while flies, and even humble 

 thrips, play their part ; but it is the hive bee 

 especially that has been made the complement of 

 the blossom, the love messenger of the little beauties 

 of our woods and fields, supplying the eyes and 

 wings which have been denied to the flower itself. 

 As, then, the visits of insects are essential to the 

 existence of most plants, the flower secures these 

 by spreading a banquet, which it decorates with 

 its own beauty, and perfumes with its own sweet 

 breath. Pollen, it is true, is necessary for blossoms 

 themselves, but the amount produced is, without excep- 

 tion, enormously greater than that required for mere 

 fertilisation ; and the excess is the flesh-forming 

 food of the pollen-gatherer; while nectar — the basis 

 of honey, the heat and force-former, as grateful 

 to the insect palate as our own — is yielded in the 



