"You are mistaken," replied the Bee, "I have been, and seen the two ladies, but they are no longer friends." Oh what fickle creatures these men and women are! young and old, they are all changeable alike. One was sitting at an open window, and the other walking up and down the room apparently much distressed; "what not one word?" said she to the other; "I did not mean to offend you."
No answer was returned, and she continued to express her sorrow, which was received with the utmost indifference; at length she made another attempt, and offering her hand to her offended friend, she said, "Come, Charlotte, will you not be reconciled?"
This also was equally disregarded, and the feelings of the poor offender seemed entirely altered; she no longer solicited forgiveness, but left the room, saying, "It is not necessary for me to acknowledge more; you do not treat me like a friend; talk no more of your regard for me."
As soon as she was gone the other began singing, as loudly as she could raise her voice, though the words she uttered now, so far from being in unison with her mind, as expressed in her countenance, that I could not help smiling; they were descriptive of content and self-satisfaction, neither of which I think she could at that time feel.
On leaving her, and entering another window, I was sorry to see the one I had been interested for in earnest conversation with a third person, who, pitying her dejected and melancholy appearance, asked if she might not attribute it to the ill humour of her friend, and while her mind was thus hurt with the treatment she had received, drew from her a complaint which perhaps she would not have made at any other time. "She does not deserve your regard," said the stranger, "and you give up too much to her;—if you continue to do so, she will by and bye expect you to say or do nothing but as she directs; and her friendship for you can never be real if she requires such subjection."
"These are very odd things," observed the Butterfly; "we poor insignificant creatures never have any thing of this sort; if we associate together, we do not spend our time in complaining of each other."
"I have not done with them yet," returned the Bee, "but mean to pay them another visit, and I fancy shall see still more reason to conclude that these wonderful creatures, whom the animal race hold in such respect, are not so steady and constant in their conduct and pursuits as either they, or we, the still meaner insect tribes, are, though I must say those of the latter order are not in so much awe of them. We do not fly from them if they come in our way, but in many things consider them as subservient to us, and that which they look upon as exclusively their own, and which a cat or a dog would not venture to touch, we have most likely made many a meal from before it comes to their table."
A few days after this, the Bee renewed his visit, as he had proposed, and there was astonished to see the very same third person now engaged with the other lady, and relating to her with many exaggerations all that her offending friend had repeated to her, while smarting under the effect of her ill humour, though all the pains she took to draw it out of her, and the encouragement with which she listened to her complaint, were entirely omitted in the recital. "Only think of this," said the Butterfly, on hearing an account of his friend's second visit. "Is this the use they make of the power of speech, and which they imagine sets them so completely above the animals? surely they had better be without it, than use it to such a purpose; but what will be the end of this? will not the eyes of the two friends be opened, think you? and they will leave the acquaintance of that mean incendiary, who, under such a show of friendship, endeavours to widen the breach between them?"