"Honey," said the guide. "Paw Bear has a sweet tooth for honey and berries."
"I should think the bees would sting him," said Jimmie.
"They do try to, but little he cares, with his thick coat of hair. Not a bit. The bees have another enemy, too, which is always hovering about to find a chance to get into the busy little house; that is the bee-moth. If she gets the least opportunity Mother Bee-Moth lays her eggs in the wax of the honeycomb, for the baby moths are very fond of wax. It's not an easy matter to get in when the bees are not looking, but she manages it quite often; and when the little larvas hatch out of the eggs, they eat the wax and the mischief is done. When Mother Bee-Moth is seen the bees rush upon her and sting her to death. They have good cause to hate her, for the wax is precious, hard to make and to mould into the little cells. It is not pleasant to have some miserable worm eat the roof from your head. Oftentimes the bees are so discouraged that they decide, as they talk it over in bee language, that it is easier to build a new home than to repair the old one. They settle upon an hour of departure, and off they go."
"But I didn't know," said Betty, "that bees live in their hives; I thought that they just stored their honey there."
"So did I," said Jimmie.
It was Jack's time to smile, for, a country boy, he had often watched the hives. "Couldn't you tell us something, sir? Here's a bit of the cone left."
"Do you want to hear?"
"Oh, I think bees are so interesting!" Betty clapped her hands.
