Well, from the very first day, my attention was attracted by something suspicious. If I sent one of the boys to plant a stake, I would see him stop frequently on his way, bend down, stand up again, look about and stoop once more, neglecting his straight line and his signals. Another, who was told to pick up the arrows, would forget and take up a pebble instead; and a third, instead of measuring angles, would crumble a clod of earth between his fingers.
Most of them were caught licking a bit of straw. The surveying suffered. What could the mystery be?
I inquired; and everything was explained. The scholars had known for a long time what the master had not yet heard of, namely, that there was a big black Bee who made clay nests on the pebbles in the fields. These nests contained honey; and my surveyors used to open them and empty the cells with a straw. The honey, although rather strong-flavored, was most acceptable. I grew fond of it myself, and joined the nest-hunters, putting off the lesson until later. It was thus that I first made the acquaintance of the Mason-bee.
The Bee herself is a magnificent insect, with dark-violet wings and a black-velvet dress. We have two kinds of Mason-bees in our district: this one, who builds by herself on walls or pebbles, and the Sicilian Mason-bee, who builds in colonies under sheds and roofs. Both use the same kind of material: hard clay, mixed with a little sand and kneaded into a paste with the Bee’s own saliva, forming, when dry, a sort of hard cement.
Man’s masonry is formed of stones laid one above the other and cemented together with lime. The Mason-bee’s work can bear comparison with ours. Instead of stones, she uses big pieces of gravel. She chooses them carefully one by one, picks out the hardest bits, generally with corners, which, fitting one into the other, make a solid whole. She holds them together with layers of her mortar, sparingly applied. Thus the outside of her cell looks like a rough stone house; but the inside, which must be smooth in order not to hurt the Bee-baby’s tender skin, is covered with a coat of pure mortar. This inner whitewash, however, is not put on artistically, but in great splashes; and the grub takes care, after it has finished eating its honey, to make itself a cocoon and hang the walls of its room with silk.
When the cell is finished, the Bee at once sets to work to provide food for it. The flowers round about, especially those of the yellow broom, which in May deck the pebbly borders of the mountain streams with gold, supply her with sugary liquid and pollen. She comes with her crop swollen with honey and her body yellowed underneath with pollen-dust. She dives headfirst into the cell; and for a few moments you see her jerk violently as she empties her crop of the honey-sirup. Afterwards, she comes out of the cell, only to go in again at once, but this time backwards. The Bee now brushes the lower side of her abdomen with her two hind-legs and rids herself of her load of pollen. Once more she comes out and once more goes in headfirst. It is a question of stirring the materials, with her jaws for a spoon, and making the whole into a smooth mixture. She does not do this after every journey; only once in a while, when she has gathered a good deal of food.
When the cell is half full of food, she thinks there is enough. An egg must now be laid on top of the paste and the house must be closed. All this is done quickly. The cover is a lid of pure mortar, which the Bee builds by degrees, working from the outside to the center. Two days at most appeared to me to be enough for everything, provided that no bad weather—rain or merely clouds—came to interrupt the work. Then a second cell is built, with its back to the first and provisioned in the same manner. A third, a fourth, and so on follow, each supplied with honey and an egg and closed before the foundations of the next are laid.
