FEEDING. 
277 
necessity of preventing his bees getting a taste of for¬ 
bidden sweets, and the inexperienced, if incautious, will 
soon learn a salutary lesson. Bees were intended to 
gather their supplies from the nectaries of flowers, and, 
while following their natural instincts, have little disposi¬ 
tion to meddle with property that does not belong to 
them ; but, if their incautious owner tempts them with 
liquid food, especially at times when they can obtain no¬ 
thing from the blossoms, they become so infatuated with 
such easy gatherings as to lose all discretion, and will 
perish by thousands if the vessels which contain the food 
are not furnished with floats, on which they can safely 
stand to help themselves. 
As the fly was not intended to banquet on blossoms, 
but on substances in which it might easily be drowned, 
it cautiously alights on the edge of any vessel containing 
liquid food, and warily helps itself; while the poor bee, 
plunging in headlong, speedily perishes. The sad fate of 
their unfortunate companions does not in the least deter 
others who approach the tempting lure, from madly alight¬ 
ing on the bodies of the dying and the dead, to share the 
same miserable end ! No one can understand the extent 
of their infatuation, until he has seen a confectioner’s shop 
assailed by myriads of hungry bees. I have seen thou¬ 
sands strained out from the syrups in which they had 
perished; thousands more alighting even upon the boiling 
sweets; the floors covered and windows darkened with 
bees, some crawling, others flying, and others still, so 
completely besmeared as to be able neither to crawl nor 
fly—not one in ten able to carry home its ill-gotten spoils, 
and yet the air filled with new hosts of thoughtless 
comers. 
I once furnished a candy-shop, in the vicinity of my 
Apiary, with guaze-wire windows and doors, after the 
