XII. HOW THE BEES GOT THEIR STINGS
Little Luke was fond of watching the bees. He was not afraid of them, for he knew that if he did not disturb or annoy them, they would not sting him.
One morning the bees in one of Uncle Mark's hives seemed greatly excited. They buzzed and buzzed about the hive, till there was a great swarm of them in the air. All at once they started in a body and flew down toward the orchard.
The little boy followed them. They settled in a great bunch on the branch of an apple tree. The little boy ran back and told Uncle Mark that the bees had swarmed. Then Uncle Mark and Sam the hired man took a beehive, a ladder, and a saw and went down to the orchard. Sam climbed the ladder, sawed off the limb, and lowered the bees to the ground. Uncle Mark set the hive over the swarm and left it awhile. He knew that the bees would settle down in the hive and soon feel at home and begin to gather honey. And so they did. But Sam the hired man was stung several times. One of his eyes swelled shut and one of his cheeks looked as if he had the toothache.
"Why did your friends sting Sam?" asked little Luke the next day of his friend Ah-mo the Honey Bee.
"Oh," answered Ah-mo, "he was too rough. The bee people have sharp tempers and ever since they got stings they are apt to use them when they get angry."
"Got stings!" exclaimed the little boy. "Didn't the bee people always have stings?"
"Oh, no," answered Ah-mo; "not always."
"How did they get them?" asked little Luke. "Tell me about it."
"Long, long ago, when the world was new," said Ah-mo, "the bee folk had no stings. They were just as busy workers as they are to-day. All day long and all summer long they flew from flower to flower and gathered wax and honey, which they stored against the winter, when there would be no flowers and no honey.
"But many of the other creatures liked honey as well as the bees. They would watch the bees till they found out where their storehouses were. Then they would break them open and steal all the honey. This was bad for the bee people. For without their honey they would starve to death during the long, cold winters.
"At last matters got so bad with the bee people that they sent a messenger to the Master of Life to ask him to come to their aid. When he had heard about their trouble, he said to their messenger, 'Go back to your people. In two moons I will come to visit you. By that time I shall have thought out a way to help you.'
"The bee people were very glad. They told their cousins, the hornets and the wasps, that the Master of Life had promised to assist them against their enemies. At the end of the two moons, the Master of Life came and all the bees assembled to meet him. The wasps and the hornets came also.
"'I have thought of a way to help you,' said the Master of Life to them. 'From this day you shall have stings. Hereafter, if anyone comes to steal your honey, you will be able to defend yourselves.'
"The bees were greatly pleased. They were no longer afraid of their enemies and did not try to hide their storehouses as they had done before.
"Now the worst of all the enemies of the bee people was Moo-ween the Black Bear. One day Mr. and Mrs. Moo-ween were walking by a hollow tree where the bees had made their home. They looked up and saw many of the bee folk going in and out of a hole in the tree.
"'What lots of honey there must be in that tree,' said Moo-ween. 'How good it would taste. Let us climb up and take it away from the bees.' So the two bears began to climb the tree.
"But the bees were not afraid of them. They did not fly away and leave the bears to eat their honey, as they had always done before. Instead, they flew down and began to sting the bears. The two bears could not understand it. They had never been stung before and they groaned and growled with pain. The bees settled upon their eyes, their ears, and their noses, and stung them again and again, until they had to let go of the tree, and fell to the ground. There they rolled over and over, growling and groaning and snapping their teeth. The bees kept on stinging them. The bears could not stand it. They got up and ran away as fast as they could, Since that time the bee folk have had stings and the courage to use them whenever any creature, little or big, attempts to annoy or injure them."
