Meantime the Old Squire was putting on a veil and gloves, and then came out with a saw in his hand, while Addison brought forth a new hive which had been hurriedly rinsed out with salt and water.
"Fetch a ladder, quick!" was the order to Halstead and me.
Theodora had brought the clothes-line, which Addison hastily took from her hands, and climbing the apple tree, attached one end of it to the bending bough upon which the dark-brown mass of bees now clustered. This seemed to me then to be a very brave act, for numbers of the bees were darting angrily about, and one—as he afterwards showed us—stung him on the wrist.
By this time the Old Squire had set the ladder, and climbing up, sawed off the bough a little back of the point where the bees were clinging to it. All this time Gram was drumming vigorously without cessation; and Theodora having fetched a broad bit of board which she placed on the ground under the tree, Addison slowly lowered the bough with the bees till it rested upon the board, when Gramp clapped the empty hive over them, and the swarm was hived; for during the day the bees went up from the bough into the top of the hive, and that evening it was gently removed to a place in the row of hives at the bee-house.
This was an early swarm, hence valuable. Gram repeated to us a proverb in rhyme which set forth the relative values of swarms.
"A swarm in May is worth a load of hay.
A swarm in June is worth a silver spoon,
But a swarm in July is not worth a fly."
July swarms would not have time to lay up a store of honey during the season of flowers.
Between bees and neighbors the forenoon was far advanced before we reached the field and began bean-planting. Quite enough of it remained, however, to render me certain that farm work, in summer, is far from being a pastime. We planted the beans among the corn which had been planted two weeks previously and was now a finger's length above the ground. The corn hills were three feet and a half apart, and between the hills of every row we now inserted a hill of beans. Halstead and I dropped the seed, three beans to a hill, going a few steps in advance of Addison and the old Squire, who followed us with hoes and covered the beans. The process of dropping was very simple; we had only to make an imprint in the soft earth with the right heel, and then drop three beans in the hole. Yet with the sun hot above my head, I found it a sweaty task, and was but too glad to hear Ellen blow the horn for dinner.
Bean-planting was the business again after dinner, but dark clouds rose in the west, shortly before three o'clock, and soon the first thunder-shower of the season rose, rumbling upward over the White Mountains. We were compelled to run for the barn. Gramp improved the opportunity to sharpen the sheep-shears, and as soon as the shower abated, sent Halstead off to notify a man at the Corners, named Peter Glinds, a professional shearer, that his services would be required on the following day. "Old Peter," as he was called, had made shearing sheep his spring vocation for many years; he was a very tall, lean, yellow old man, who was reported to use a plug of tobacco a day, the year round.
Addison set about preparing a half-hogshead tub to hold the poke decoction for immersing the lambs after the sheep were sheared.