CONDUCT OF THE BEES TOWARDS THE QUEEN. 203 



to the booming of a bassoon, intermingled, at times, with 

 the harmonious shrillness of the Scotch bagpipe. 



There is, however, a most extraordinary circumstance still 

 to be related, touching the conduct of the victorious queen. 

 It was most natural for her to expect, that after her splendid 

 victory, she was to be immediately installed into all the rights, 

 privileges, and immunities of royalty, but in this expectation 

 her majesty was most egregiously disappointed, for the 

 common bees treated her with the most marked indignity. 

 She was literally sent to Coventry, for not one of her sub- 

 jects would hold any intercourse with her. If she pre- 

 sumed to insert her proboscis into a cell for the purpose of 

 partaking of a little refreshment, she was most unceremoni- 

 ously jostled by the bees, and driven away. In fact, she was 

 subject to all the taunts and rudeness of the canaille of the 

 hive; if, says Mr. Huber, she seemed disposed to take a 

 nap, the bees immediately pounced upon her and roused her 

 from her slumbers. This singular conduct completely stag- 

 gered the conceptive powers of Mr. Huber ; he had never 

 witnessed such a scene before, and, therefore, the whole was 

 to him an insoluble problem. It did not, however, long 

 remain so, for he discovered that the bees were not like the 

 English people in the reign of Queen Elizabeth ; they were 

 determined not to be governed by a virgin queen. This 

 determination of the bees was, by some means unknown to 

 Mr. Huber, conveyed to her majesty, and she resolved not 

 to lose any time in removing the cause of complaint, which 

 her subjects had raised against her. She, therefore, went 

 forth on a vagabondizing expedition into the regions of 

 the air, and in a very short time returned, to the great de- 

 light of Mr. Huber, and the entire satisfaction of her sub- 

 jects, with all the external signs of fecundation, that is, with 

 the genital organ of the drone attached to her. Huber seems 

 to imply that a kind of committee was appointed to ascertain 

 the verity of that fact, which being confirmed and reported 

 k 2 



