"But connected with this, another important purpose of nature is fulfilled, which must not here pass without special notice. The principle, so fruitful in important social consequences among animals, that the offspring owes its parentage jointly to two individuals of different sexes, or, in other words, must always have a father and a mother, equally prevails in the vegetable kingdom. There also are the gentlemen and ladies, there also are the loves which unite them, loves which, as well as those of superior orders of beings, have supplied a theme for poets. Now, among the many other interesting offices with which the Author of nature has invested the little creatures which form the subject of this notice, not the least singular is that of being the priests who celebrate the nuptials of the flowers. It is the bee literally which joins the hands and consecrates the union of the fair virgin lily and the blushing maiden rose with their respective bridegrooms. The grains of pollen which we have been describing are these bride and bridegrooms, and are transported on the bee from the male to the female flower; the happy individuals thus united in the bands of wedlock being the particular grains which the bee lets fall from its body on the flower of the opposite sex, as it passes through its blossom.
"And here we find another circumstance to excite our admiration of the wise laws of that Providence, which cares for the well-being of a little flower as much as for that of a great lord of the creation. If the bee wandered indifferently from flower to flower without selection, the gentlemen of one species would be mated with the ladies of another, hybrid breeds would ensue, and the confusion of species would be the consequence. But the bee, as knowing this, flies from rose to rose, or from lily to lily, but never from the lily to the rose, or from the rose to the lily."—Lardner.
GENERAL.
A popular acquaintance with the habits of bees is very important. Such an accident as the following, related in the Scotsman newspaper, could scarcely have occurred if the victim had learned a little on this subject:—
"On Thursday, while Dr. Bonthron, of West Linton, Peebleshire, was being driven along the road leading from Garvald to the railway station at Dolphinton, he was attacked by a swarm of bees, apparently newly 'cast-off,' and so severely stung on the face and head as to be unable to attend to his duties for the present. His face and head became dreadfully swollen and disfigured an hour or two after the occurrence, the eyes being firmly closed, and the face and throat greatly swollen and discoloured, while a considerable amount of fever has set in from the effects of the poison—in fact, but for the precautions taken, it is probable that the case would have proved fatal. The driver of the vehicle was also severely stung on several parts of the head and neck, and only escaped further mischief by a timely use of whip and rein. The queen-bee of the caste must have flown directly on Dr. Bonthron's head, from the instantaneousness with which he was perfectly covered by the bees: and it is supposed that the motion of the vehicle must have irritated the insects to use their stings. Upwards of thirty bee-stings were taken out of Dr. Bonthron's face, neck, and head."
Had Dr. Bonthron remained perfectly still, the bees would not have been irritated, and they would have discovered there was no room for a swarm of bees in his hat; and if the driver could have distinguished the queen-bee, and quietly removed and laid her on the hedge-side, no catastrophe would have occurred. Bees are perfectly harmless in swarming. But of course any attempt to drive them off from their queen by violence never can be made with impunity.
But in the swarming season it is most expedient that nobody but their bee-master should take any share in hiving a swarm; for so nervous are most people at the presence of ten thousand stings, that they will indiscreetly and ignorantly irritate such members of the young family as may accidentally alight on them.
A far more delightful incident is recorded by Thorley:—
"In or about the year 1717, one of my swarms settling among the close-twisted branches of some codling-trees, and not to be got into an hive without more help, my maid-servant, hired into the family the Michaelmas before, very officiously offered her assistance, so far as to hold the hive while I dislodged the bees, she being little apprehensive of what followed.
"Having never been acquainted with bees, and likewise afraid, she put a linen cloth over her head and shoulders, concluding that would be a sufficient guard, and secure her from their swords. A few of the bees fell into the hive; some upon the ground; but the main body of them upon the cloth which covered her upper garments.