“We once were larvæ ourselves,” meekly observed Silverwing.
“Yes, and not very long ago,” replied Sipsyrup rather pertly, glancing at the whitish down that showed her own youth; for it was but three days since she had quitted her own nursery, which may account for her being so silly a young bee.
“And but for the kindness of those who supplied our wants when we were poor helpless little creatures, we should never have lived to have wings,” continued her companion.
“Don’t remind me of that time,” buzzed Sipsyrup, who could not bear to think of herself as a tiny, feeble worm. “Anything more weary and tiresome than the life that I led, shut up all alone in that horrid cell, spinning my own coverlet from morning till night, I am sure that I cannot imagine. Ah, speaking of that spinning, if you had only seen what I did yesterday.”
“What was that?” inquired Silverwing.
“As I flew past a sunny bank, facing the south, I noticed a small hole, at the entrance of which I saw one of our cousins, the poppy-bees. Her dress, you must know, is different from ours” (Sipsyrup always thought something of dress). “It is black, studded on the head and back with reddish-gray hairs, and her wings are edged with gray. Wishing to notice a little more closely her curious attire, I stopped and wished her good-day. Very politely she invited me into her parlour, and I entered the hole in the bank.”
“A dull, gloomy place to live in, I should fear.”
“Dull! gloomy!” exclaimed Sipsyrup, quivering her feelers at the recollection; “why, the cell of our queen is a dungeon compared to it. The hole grew wider as we went further in, till it appeared quite roomy and large, and all round it was hung with the most splendid covering, formed of the leaves of the poppy, of a dazzling scarlet, delightful to behold. Since I saw it, I have been scarcely able to bear the look of this old hive, with its thousands of cells, one just like another, and all of the same white hue.”
“Had the poppy-bee a queen?” inquired Silverwing.
“No; she is queen, and worker, and everything herself; she has no one to command her, no one to obey; no waspish companion like Stickasting there.”