274 The Honey-Makers 



mies and sent to Syria by Caesar in command of forces, was 

 poisoned by Pompey's followers. 



" His dead body also lay for a long time embalmed in 

 honey, till Anthony afterwards sent it to Judsea, and caused 

 it to be buried in the royal sepulchres." 



There is a Mohammedan legend to the effect that the 

 body of Alexander the Great was placed in a golden coffin 

 filled with honey. 



The habits of the bee, as well as its remarkable products, 

 no doubt helped establish its high place in the minds of the 

 people. In contrast to the belief in the story of the car- 

 cass, Aristotle tells us the bee approaches nothing that is 

 putrid, only sweet things ; and from the earliest time there 

 has been a behef in the purity of the bee that has given an 

 added value to its honey and wax, particularly in religious 

 ceremonials. 



In Oriental countries honey very often constituted a part 

 of the first food of children, and in its capacity of providing 

 nourishment became quite naturally symbohcal of the nurse 

 or the mother, and hence doubtless one reason for its con- 

 stant relation to those divinities connected with procreation. 



Dionysos, or Bacchus, in his earher form was a most be- 

 neficent god, also symbolizing that force in nature which 

 rises into new life after the sleep of death, or the coming 

 of spring after winter. He was the bearer of high in- 

 spiration to man, freeing him from sordid and petty cares. 



According to Ovid it was Bacchus who first discovered 

 honey. As he moved through the woods of the Thessalian 

 mountains Rhodope and Pangsea, accompanied by his train 

 of followers making the air resound with their music, the 

 birds flew near overcome by curiosity, and with them the 

 hitherto unknown bees. 



Bacchus caught the pretty creatures that were thus fruit- 

 lessly flying about, and shut them up in a hollow tree. 



