THE HONEY-BEE IN NEW ZEALAND. 
65 
are utterly careless what they allow to enter their lungs. 
Now, the truth is, it is easier to poison a man through 
his lungs than through his stomach. My bees would 
die in a London bed-room in twelve hours. 
7. Bees are very early risers. The first ray of sunshine 
is their matin bell, and by seven o’clock p.m. they are 
most of them at home. People that live long and are 
healthy differ in many of their habits, but generally agree 
in being early risers. Early light has sanitary as well as 
photographic influences, which post-meridian light is a 
stranger to. “ Early to bed and early up” is an admirable 
maxim—an axiom among bees, and it should be a habit 
among rational men. 
8. Bees are peaceful and peacemakers. This will appear 
a hasty statement to all who remember that bees have 
stings. But a little thought will justify what I say. Bees 
never give way to aggressive warfare. They never attack 
those who do not attack their queen or their homestead. 
Their stings are purely defensive. This is a very curious 
fact, and very suggestive also. If they had no stings at 
all, they would be an argument for the Peace Society. 
But as it is, they prove that the best defence of home is a 
good preparation to repel the aggressor. When, there¬ 
fore, Mr. Bright preaches the duty of breaking up the 
navy and disbanding the army, it would be the conduct, of 
a great hornet impressing on bees the duty of extracting 
their stings. Were the bees such simpletons as to listen 
to his plausible logic, and give up their stings, they would 
be surrounded by swarms of wasps, who would very soon 
make them give up their honey. As if to teach the bees 
that their weapons are to be used only in the last extrem¬ 
ity every bee knows that the use of his sting is followed 
by its inevitable loss and his destruction. It sticks where 
it strikes, and the violence done to the bee ends always in 
death While admiring Mr. Bright’s love of peace, I hope 
every bee-keeper will prefer the bees’ way of maintaining 
it. So sweet and short is a bee-master s sermon. 
In conclusion, as Mr. Cotton says, a good deal of t 0 
craft of beekeeping is different in New Zealand from 
that which is useful in England. The length of the 
