Only one bee lays eggs. She is the queen and the mother of all the others. She is a good deal larger than they are, and they all obey her.
One day about the end of May, just as the children's lessons for the morning were over, they heard the gardener come into the hall to tell their grandpapa that one of the hives had swarmed.
"Oh! what is that?" they cried. "Do tell us; do let us go and see."
"Wait a little, wait a little," said grandpapa. "It means that the hive won't hold all the bees any longer; there are too many of them in it, and the old queen bee has left it, with some thousands of her subjects, to a young queen that will now reign in her stead."
"We must see about a new hive for her, gardener."
"Yes, sir; we have it all ready. Bob is waiting with it in the garden now."
Bob was the young man who milked the cow, and minded the pony and the pigs and fowls.
"Oh, do let us go too," cried all the children.
"I must hear what grandmamma says," said grandpapa. "It won't do for any of you to get stung, you know."
Just then grandmamma came into the hall to see what all the commotion was about.