CHAPTER III.
A FLATTERING INVITATION.
WAXYWILL and Honeyball had both come to the assistance of Silverwing, and she buzzed her thanks in a grateful way to both, though different motives had brought them to her aid, for they were very different bees in their dispositions.
Honeyball was a good-humoured, easy kind of creature. Very ready to do a kindness if it cost her little trouble, but lazy as any drone in the hive. Honeyball would have liked to live all day in the bell of a foxglove, with nothing to disturb her in her idle feast. It was said in the hive that more than, once she had been known to sip so much, that at last she had been unable to rise, and for hours had lain helpless on the ground. Sipsyrup, who, like other vain, silly creatures, was very fond of talking about other people’s concerns, had even whispered that Honeyball had been seen busy at one of the provision-cells stored for the winter’s use, which it is treason in a bee to touch; but as those who talk much generally talk a little nonsense, we may hope that there was no real ground for the story.
Waxywill was one of whom such a report would never have been believed; there was not a more honourable or temperate worker in the hive. Yet Stickasting herself was scarcely less liked, so peevish and perverse was the temper of this bee. If desired to do anything, it was sure to be the very thing which she did not fancy. Were cells to be built—she could not bear moping indoors; if asked to bring honey—she always found out that her wings were tired. She could not bear submission to the laws of the hive, and once actually shook her wings at the queen! When she flew to help Silverwing, it was less out of kindness to her than the love of opposing Stickasting. And yet Waxywill was not an ungenerous bee; she had more sense too than insects generally possess; she would have been respected and even loved in the hive, had not her stubborn, wilful temper spoilt all.
We will now follow Sipsyrup in her hasty flight, as, leaving both her friend and her charges behind, she made her retreat from Stickasting. How delightful she found the fine fresh air, after the heated hive! Now up, now down, she pursued her varying course, sometimes humming for a moment around some fragrant flower, then, even before she had tasted its contents, deserting it for one yet more tempting. Deeply she plunged her long tongue into its cup; her curious pliable tongue, so carefully guarded by Nature in a nicely fitting sheath. “Sheathe your tongue!” was an expression which the gossipping little bee had heard more often than she liked, especially from the mouth of Waxywill. It might be an expressive proverb in other places than Bee-land, for there are tongues whose words are more cutting than swords, that much need the sheath of discretion.