Happy

“It means,” said he, “that, late as the season is, the swarming fever has seized the colony.”

“Why?” we cried.

“Well, we have so much honey and there is so much in the field and the colony so strong, it can easily spare a force of pioneers to begin a new colony. Here is the working out of destiny controlling the very life of the bee.”

Crip spoke enthusiastically, and both Buzz-Buzz and I were fascinated by his story.

The first thing I knew I, also, was seized with the enthusiasm. Queen-cells had been started—half a dozen at least. I laid hold and helped draw out the comb to build up a huge cell, where, in the mysterious processes of time, a Queen would appear!

Almost against her wishes, the Queen-Mother deposited eggs in the various cells and began, under mild protest, to expand her brood-chamber in anticipation of the promised exodus of her children. While she did not fear that enough would go to imperil the existence of her own colony, she doubted the wisdom of the enterprise. She discouraged in every way possible the ardor of the workers who continued to bring in honey until there was no longer space to store it. Indeed, they crowded the Queen so that she was driven to despair. The very space she had set aside for her brood-chamber for the winter was encroached upon and heaped with bread and honey, but for the nonce there was no stopping them.

Crip said: “You are crazy; it is too late in the season to swarm; it means extinction.”

But one replied: “It is the law! There is a chance for the swarm to survive, and the chance must be taken; particularly when the parent colony shows its ability to survive.”

“Truly said,” added Crip. “I merely wanted to find whether you knew what the higher law compels.”

But where would the swarm begin a home? This question now began to be asked. It seemed that nobody thought of the great Master who sat for hours under the mesquite-tree. Would he not provide a house?

The next day Buzz-Buzz came to me, greatly excited. “You and I and others are to go into the woods and search for a home for the swarm!”

That was the order. It was enough—we went.

We seemed to know that the only place to look for a home was among the great oaks that bordered the lake, and thither we betook ourselves. We flew from tree to tree, exploring every hole we could find in the hope of discovering a hollow big enough to house a swarm. Three days we spent in vain. On the fourth we found one, and with great joy we returned home and reported. Immediately a hundred bees or more were assigned to prepare the hollow tree for a habitation. Buzz-Buzz and I led the way back, and all hands fell to cleaning out the cobwebs and the débris of decayed wood. Several days were spent in this undertaking, and finally the word was passed that the new home was ready.

But things were not ready with the parent colony. No Queen had emerged from her cell. From hour to hour the bees marched by impatiently, waiting for the “click-click” of her mandibles and for sight of them piercing the wax door to the cell. And there was much speculation as to which of the half-dozen possible Queens would first emerge. Finally, one day, at high noon, the rumor ran over the hive that a Queen had been born, and the excitement became intense. “A Queen! A Queen!”

Crip and I forced our way through the crush to the spot where the Queen was surrounded by a joyous multitude. He, finally, on account of his lameness, was compelled to abandon his efforts to pay his homage to the new-born mother. But I, nothing daunted, persisted, and presently came near enough to feel her presence. I, too, sang fervently, for a new hope had risen. Soon in the vast forest of the world a new colony would be planted to aid in carrying on the eternal work of the bee.

At another corner of the hive I heard a different sound. It was the wail of a Queen that was being destroyed. I hurried toward her, but somehow felt no pity for her. A great cluster of bees completely enveloped her; this was the mode of taking the royal life. All the remaining cells with their occupants had been cut down, and soon there remained in all the hive but the one mother and the one daughter. I came upon the destroyed cells, torn and empty, and could not help mourning the death of the royal creatures they had housed. Perhaps there had been but minutes between the births of the Queens, but those minutes had been fatal to the last.

Preparations went steadily on for the day of the exodus. The new Queen took her first flight successfully; and then came the mating! Only a few drones had been permitted to escape the massacre of a month earlier—tolerated on the chance of a lost or a dead Queen—borne with against a belated mating.

“How wonderful,” Crip observed, “that these things should be provided for—and how close are life and death!”

It was a hot afternoon when the time came for the nuptial flight, and it lacked the wild glamour of an earlier one that I had witnessed. On the first occasion there were literally thousands of drones that went up toward the heavens in search of the one radiant thing in the world. And they had all returned save one immortal, who had found and won the Queen, only to lose his life! Compared with the first flight, this last seemed commonplace. I should have foregone the opportunity of witnessing the thin procession, bound on the momentous journey of uniting two lives, so that the thread of existence might not be cut short for the bee.

I groped about impatiently, awaiting news of the bridal party. It was not long delayed, for soon there were sounds of rejoicing throughout the hive; and now the last preparations had been ended and the day was at hand for the great adventure.

Round and round the hive went the signal that on the morrow the swarm should go forth to its home in the woods. Quietly and with no bickerings, the tallies were laid—this one should go, this one should stay—there was in no case dispute or contest. Each bee accepted the issue with all the grace of a fatalist. I was one of them.

Really, I was greatly disappointed not to have been chosen to go, for I had been one of the pioneers and had helped find and prepare the new home in the live-oak by the clear waters of the beautiful lake. It was a bitter disappointment, but I uttered no word of complaint. When I came up with Crip I found he, too, had been left behind.

“Why shouldn’t we have been chosen to go?” I asked, somewhat downcast.

“I am too old—too useless,” Crip answered. “You are young and brave enough, but battles are to be fought here as well as yonder. And some of the strong and gallant had need to remain.”

Something in Crip’s look and tone struck me. Was I too old to go? Had that been the reason? I had heard a cry over the hive that only young bees should go, for there would be small hope of raising much of a brood in the new colony through the winter. If it could build comb enough and gather sufficient honey to feed itself, it would be fortunate.

So, I was not young enough. Until then I had not thought of my age; it seemed to me that I was still as active as on the day I flew into the sky.

As for Crip, “too useless” seemed a cruel phrase. For who could say what was the worth of his stores of knowledge? But I could see that he moved more feebly from day to day.

“Only the strong are to be chosen—the fit? Crip, that bears hard on us.”

“Not a bit of it,” he replied, cheerily. “Take courage; that is the way of things in the world of the bee.”

Then he added that it would be a hard battle to build a home in the short space of time allotted and to store food enough to last through the winter. It meant a fight, for already the glimmerings of the fall were upon us! Pale shadows of color began to stain the leaves, and the flowers turned their faces more wistfully each day to the sun. Still, the bees would go. There was no denying the operation of the law, which commanded that the chance be taken. The whole law of survival was involved—and there was none to deny it.

So, all night long murmurings and vague discontents and forebodings and anticipations ran through the hive. Those marked so mysteriously to go realized that their lives were at stake and likely to be lost. Yet each one in the hive would have gone. It was not until late that I learned that our own mother, my mother, the mother of the hive, was to go away, leaving her daughter to preside over the destinies of the old. Here, too, Crip was wont to philosophize.

“You see, our mother is not young,” he began. “If she should perish in the stress of the winter and the new colony be lost, it would be less grievous than the loss of this new, vigorous Queen. Besides, our mother has had experience. She has lived over one winter. She knows how much of a brood to rear to maintain the strength of the colony—or whether she dare rear any at all—bearing in mind the while that there must be a fine adjustment between the mouths to be fed and the total of supplies. She knows well how to keep this account. Last winter, I am told, our stores ran low, so low, in fact, that many of our brothers sacrificed their lives in order to conserve the supplies so as to bring the Queen-Mother with a few attendants through the long, bitter winter. Not a young bee was reared until the first flowers had come riotously trampling on the skirts of the frost. So, you see, they know best. She will lead the swarm, and perhaps, if the season is late, and the frost slow to come, they can build their combs and store sufficient honey to bring them through. Perhaps even spring may come to their rescue, blossoming early. A late, backward spring, however, might end them, even if they had escaped the fury of the winter.”

There seemed no end to Crip’s knowledge. Lying there on the comb, he looked pathetically helpless, and there was a quaver in his voice. I could see that he was reflecting—that age had dropped upon him heavily on account of his wounds. Then, stoic that he was, I knew that some morning I should search in vain for trace of him. Once a bee becomes useless, he said, there is but one thing for him to do. I knew that Crip was already contemplating the end. Bitterness for a moment welled up in me at the thought that so much wisdom should be lost—and so soon. That was the edict. But, after all, was the wisdom really lost?

Our talk was broken at length by the call of the morning. The first pale gleams of light filtered through the entrance of the hive. Already there were murmurings and presently the faint note of the swarm.

Two hours passed—three hours—and now the trumpet sounded for the flight. Each of the chosen rushed to the nearest cell and filled his sac to its utmost capacity. Some early-returning foragers, laden with pollen, heard the signal and made ready to go, carrying with them their loads. Stores must be taken along to last until comb was built and new supplies gathered from the fields. Rations for three or four days were thus provided. When all was ready the trumpet sounded again and the march began. In the fore went the scouts who were to lead the way to the new home. Then, following after, came the chosen ones in a mighty multitude, and lastly the Queen.

Out into the air they flew, then round and round, each one singing the Song of the Swarm, which could be heard afar off. Round and round in a dizzy circle they flew, but in an ever-widening whirl. The scouts, I could hear from my point of vantage at the door, were becoming impatient. The Queen had been delayed, and until word of her presence among them was spoken, they could only circle about. Or else, failing that word, they could and would return to the hive. But at the height of their impatience the glad word came, “The Queen is here!”

Then they delayed no longer, but started in a whirlwind flight toward the lake and to their new home, uttering, as they drew away, that marvelously wild and moving song which pulsed with the tremors of life and death.

From the alighting-board we watched them draw away and disappear, and were on the eve of turning into the hive, when up came the Master breathlessly. He stopped and gazed at the retreating cloud, knowing too well what had happened. He knew, too, by their actions, that a home had been prepared for their reception. He seemed surprised to think that the bees should swarm so late in the season, and not a little chagrined to think they could have done it under his eyes. His curiosity at once led him to find whence the swarm had come, and he walked straight to our hive. A few excited bees were still flying back and forth, but Crip and I, like the condemned, stood stolidly and wondered.

His lips moved, but he said no word; he turned on his heels and went away.

Shortly, however, he returned, the little Shadow with him. They were talking of the swarming, for he pointed the way the bees had gone. In his hand he held that horrid smoking thing, and Crip and I both knew what that meant. He would open our house. I resented this, for I remembered the smoke in my eyes when he took the top off our hive and lifted out frame after frame, taking away from us part of our honey. I remembered, too, how I longed to sting him, but how all my efforts were unavailing, for he had hidden himself under a screen. And yet I really did not want to sting him. Just why I flew at him I could not understand.

“He is angry with us now,” said Crip. “He knows we are insane. He probably will take away our honey and leave us to starve, as we merit. We have proven our short-sightedness and have lost our right to survive.”

“No, he will not do that,” I replied.

On the instant I seemed no longer to distrust him; I remembered his kindness to me on a day when, overladen, a gust of wind had felled me to the earth. He had placed me on a twig, where, after disgorging part of my load, and washing my body and my wings, I again made way to my home.

But it was certain that we should know his intentions shortly, for, on coming close, he sent a puff of smoke into the entrance that choked and blinded both Crip and me and the guards, and sent us scurrying into the hive. Then, passing the smoker to the Little Master, he carefully lifted off the top and the upper section of our hive, and began an inspection of the brood-chamber. He seemed to be right happy at discovering that the queen-cells had been destroyed, which carried the assurance to his mind that no further swarming was in contemplation; but when his eyes fell upon the new Queen-Mother, they widely distended and a smile of joy lighted his face.

“Wonderful creature,” he murmured.

The little Shadow cried: “Let me see. Isn’t she a beauty!”

By this time the smoke had cleared away and my disposition had changed. I said to Crip that we ought to attack them. But he answered that it would be folly now—that only evil would result. Further parleying was cut short by a blast of smoke shot at us by the Little Master, who apparently had discerned outward signs of the rebellion, for my body was poised and I suppose I must have been emitting the note of anger. The smoke sent us all flying into a remote corner of the hive.

Then the Master replaced the section of hive he had removed, and began to lift frame after frame, uttering little exclamations, as though he had not suspected that we had gathered such quantities of honey in so short and late a season. It was easy for him now to understand why we had developed the swarming fever, although it evidently appeared to him a foolish adventure.

“He has been dreaming in his rose-garden,” commented Crip, when the Master had nearly finished his examination. “That is the reason he has neglected us of late. He did not know there had been a great flow of honey.”

We were talking among ourselves, when up came Buzz-Buzz, angry from the smoke in his eyes.

“A fine lot this fellow,” he growled.

“You don’t like him?” I asked.

He just looked at us. He was too irritated to speak.

“He’ll get over it,” mused Crip.

We were still holding converse when again the top came off and one by one the Master lifted out our combs and robbed them of their honey. They were battered and broken and empty when he restored them to us. We were all infuriated, and for a while flew madly about him and about the Little Master—the dog kept at a respectful distance—straining every effort to drive them away. But the Little One only smoked us the more, while the Master went on with his work. He was careful to kill no bee, brushing off every one of them before taking away the combs of honey, and while returning them.

Quickly it was all over. When he had gone we at once took stock and found that he had left us quite enough to carry us through the winter, barring accident. But almost before the appraisal had been made a catastrophe was upon us. The honey from a broken comb had flooded the bottom-board, and began to pour out through the entrance onto the ground, and robber bees were shortly upon it. We summoned all our guards for our protection, but the robbers in thousands came, and in spite of our resistance they forced their way into the hive and began to plunder at random. Poor old Crip even mixed in the mêlée, fighting like a veteran, while I, beaten and trampled, finally lay senseless on the floor.

We should have been lost but for the thoughtfulness of the Master, who, returning to see that all was well, found us besieged and overrun. He quietly closed the entrance to our hive, and thus left us to clear it of the marauders within doors, which we did promptly, although at heavy cost in the lives of our brothers. An hour later he returned and opened ever so slightly our door. Although a few robbers still lingered and endeavored to force an entrance, they were easily beaten off. In the mean time we carefully cleaned up the spilled honey which had nearly been our undoing—and the battle was over.

The night came and we cleared our house of the dead. Scattered indiscriminately they lay—friend and foe—many score of them. Among them I found the veteran who had been kind to me, with the mark of a lance in his breast. Certain it was that he had died fighting bravely. I had found his body, and I determined to keep it by me through the night, and on the morrow I meant to give a fitting burial. I remembered a high knoll overlooking the lake and the country round about, and there I said he should be laid to rest. I told Crip of my purpose, and he applauded me, and together we watched over him. More than once we almost had to fight to prevent the cleaners from taking his body away.

On the morrow, in the early dawn, I dragged him forth and, taking him in my mandibles, flew away with him, dropping him on the knoll. The poor old veteran! Somehow I had gained the notion that one day he would awake, and from that vantage-point find himself nearer the stars.

We now began another chapter in the life of our colony. We were left with none too much honey, and, besides, our numbers had been greatly depleted by the exodus and by the assault of the robbers. Our Queen-Mother immediately organized her followers and sent us all scouring the fields for additional foods. Thanks to the late season, there still remained an abundant harvest. Soon we had replenished our supplies to a point where we could rest comfortably, and our good mother set about rearing just enough brood to have us weather the winter safely. But we never stopped work. Day after day we gathered bread and honey.

“We cannot have too much,” said Crip. “You see, since you have not gone through a winter you have much to learn. It is no simple business. Frightful northers sweep down upon us and chill us and kill us. Sometimes it grows so cold the young bees are frozen in their cells. They must then be removed, or else sickness and disease will follow. Sometimes, too, if stores run low and our numbers fall below a certain point, we ourselves can no longer keep warm. That means death for us all.”

“But we have plenty of stores,” I replied. “We have nothing to fear.”

“There are always fears. An animal running wild may topple over your house; a bad man may slip in and steal your supplies; a moth may enter and lay eggs producing destructive worms; a bear may chance to find you and with his great paws rend the hive asunder!”

“Stop!” I cried. “If there are yet other dangers, I do not wish to know them.”

“But it is well to know. There are diseases to combat, such as dysentery, paralysis, and foul brood—”

“Oh, stop!” I begged him.

Was life really such a hazard? so perilous a journey? And all for what? Toward what misty goal?

It was a glorious day in October. The Indian summer had come, flooding all the hills and vales with its magical sheets of amethyst, while a drowsy wind from the south bore on its breath the odor of autumn. Now and then that indefinable note, presaging the advent of winter—a note which is neither a requiem nor a dirge—could be heard like a faint flute in the branches of the trees. The sun shone big and round and still with a suggestion of summer. Scattered clouds went drifting lazily by, wonderfully emphasizing the turquoise blue of the sky.

“Is it going to rain?” I asked of Crip, who was dragging himself along on the alighting-board, ready for a new excursion into the woods.

“No,” he mumbled.

It had been weeks since my experience in the flood, but ever after that when a cloud was in the sky I bethought me of rain. But I had now come to know that rains were something more than clouds.

Crip and I had been laboring to fill adjoining cells. We had already gathered many loads of honey that day. “I’m tired,” he said, right plaintively. “I can’t do as much as I could once.”

“Why don’t you rest?” I begged of him.

“Rest! What word is that? Did ever a bee rest when there was work to do?”

With that he hobbled a little farther on his four legs, his poor old body half carried and half dragged. But his wings were still powerful and lifted him instantly into the all-absorbing space.

This time I took an entirely different direction from any I had thus far traveled. On and on I flew, mile after mile, until presently I scented something and went for it. It proved to be a field of June corn, in silk and tassel—and, oh, what quantities of pollen! I gathered a little and hastened back to report. Almost at once a string of my brothers were flying to and fro, laden with bread.

We had now stored up a great surplus of food, and the Queen-Mother broadened her brood areas. She deemed it wise to enlarge her family; first, because she had a premonition that a wild winter would soon break upon us, and, for the further reason, that half the battle was to be strong in numbers in the spring, when the honey-fountains opened.

When I returned with my last load, well toward sunset, I found Crip waiting at our rendezvous, my ancient cell.

“You have done well to-day,” he said, “and I wanted to tell you so. Five miles is a long journey to go for a load, but it was worth it. I, too, made one trip—but have pity on me—only when I got there did I remember that I had no basket-legs; hence I was forced to return empty-handed. It is too much for me to bear. I am old and useless.”

I could not stand to hear him depreciate himself in such fashion, and remonstrated with him.

“Well, it’s too true,” he persisted. “Some day you will understand.”

It was now fast growing dark, and the last workers were dropping on the alighting-board and groping their way into the hive. It was the duty of guards to inspect all who entered, and to keep out bugs and ants and intruders. More than a score of guards, I among them, kept a continuous patrol before the entrance; and all went well until far into the night.

The Master with his little Shadow had passed among us as if to bid us good night, and had gone. The moon was now rising, and a mocking-bird in a neighboring tree had been rendering melodies without number. There was no sound in all the world save the mocking-bird’s song that ebbed and flowed in ever wilder cadence. High above his perch he would soar into the moonlight, and as he dropped again—his little gray body looking like a bit of mist—he would almost burst his throat with rapturous song. Often had I heard him sing, but never had he so completely abandoned himself to the sheer frenzy of it—and at such an hour!

“He’s making the best of it, for soon the winter will come and his songs will cease,” observed a guard.

“But what glorious singing!” added another.

While we were talking a guard suddenly gave an alarm. He had either scented or seen an enemy; but doubt was immediately removed, for the raw smell of an animal was borne in to us. We paused and prepared for an attack. Our wings were buzzing at intervals and our stings were ready to strike. And none too soon, for in a moment more a monstrous animal stuck his nose into the entrance of our hive. Instantly we all flew at him, some landing in his face and some on his body. But only those that struck his face succeeded in stinging him, for the hair was too long on his body.

I was unfortunate enough to have been one of those landing on his back, and immediately found myself so entangled in his hair that I could neither sting him nor free myself. I struggled in vain, and my efforts were rendered more difficult on account of the mad capers he cut in escaping from the spot. The moment we flew at him and stung him about the head, he turned somersaults and cried like a cat in torment, while he fled madly. So wildly did he fly that he banged squarely into a neighboring hive and nearly upset it. Then he collided with weeds and brush and cacti—in fact, I now suspect he could see nothing. Certainly he cared not what lay in his road.

I can think of it calmly, now that I am safely back, but while I rode unwillingly upon his back I thought each instant would be my last. After vainly trying to reach his body in order to sting him, I gave over and endeavored to free myself. What with the buzzing of many pairs of wings in his ears, and the pain from the stings, he fled like the wind. Presently, however, he stopped suddenly and tried to reach me with his claws. Then he did his best to crush me with his teeth, snarling and whining betimes. He did crush some of my brother guards; but I was just back of his ears, and he could not reach me. However, I may add I almost wished he had, for his breath was horrible. I never could abide the breath of any living thing.

Soon he gave over and set out running again at top speed. I had abandoned myself for lost, when a bush scraped me out of my entanglement and I fell half dead to the ground. But the would-be robber never stopped, for I could hear the brush rattling in his wake. He still fled incontinently, as though he feared another attack, as though his very life depended on his rate of speed.

I lay there for a moment, scarcely able to move. But what could I do? The moon was still bright, but bright as it was, the way back home was dark. Instinctively, I turned to a friendly bush and made my way to the topmost branch, and there I planted myself for the rest of the night.

The wind was blowing lustily. I did not like the threshing back and forth of the branches in the gloom, with the chance of being knocked off at any moment. I could not think calmly of crawling on the ground, for Crip had told me this was a thing to be avoided at all hazards. Scorpions and beetles and toads and snakes made the night perilous. So I clung to the branch with all my might. Now and again a pause in the wind would allow me to look up at the stars through the screen of leaves—and how dear and wonderful they were! Long ago I had thought how beautiful it must be up there in the blue space, fretted with tiny lights no bigger than the candle burning in the window of the Master’s house. And even then, as I turned, I could see his lamp, and I almost started to fly toward it. There was a fascination in its beams which I could scarcely resist. Always, when on guard duty, at any hour of the night, I had been able to see his light and to hear the bark of his dog. He seemed never to sleep—or if he slept the lamp and the dog kept watch over him.

The blustering wind finally had compassion on me and ceased altogether. There came a silence that was more than silence. I felt it oppressive. Then, as if a pause had been made for them, the crickets and katydids began a frightful chattering, which was punctuated betimes by the far hooting of an owl. The air grew chilly, and I began to feel cold and stiff, and held none too securely to my bush. It was a fortunate thing, I thought, that the wind had died away.

How tired I was! This had been one of the hardest days of my life. As I reflected on it, it seemed very long ago that it began; and I heartily wished for the dawn. I must have drowsed awhile, for when again I looked about me a mellow light brooded on the horizon and a great star beamed above it. Soon wide streams of gold flowed across the pale-blue sky, quenching the fires of the stars. Then, as if in compensation for their loss, fleecy Gulf clouds caught the early rays of the sun and filled the world with showers of rainbow lights.

Presently I could see well enough to rise on my wings, and in spite of the chill in the air, up I went until I got my bearings. A strange fit seized me. “Fly to the sun!” I heard in my ears; and off I went. Up and up I flew—higher and higher—until below me I could scarcely see the white houses of the apiary where I lived and the white house of the Master. But under me the waters of Lake Espantoso glimmered like a mirror, and in the dark fringe of trees that bordered it I remembered a swarm of my little brothers had taken refuge, and I wondered how they fared. Far as I could see stretched the undulating hills over which I had flown in search of treasure—hills now clad in their robes of autumn. A fragrance reached me at this great height, which came from I knew not where.

I had wheeled about and started home, when I caught sight of the Master wandering dreamily in his garden. Then immediately I knew that the fragrance came from his beautiful roses. Many a time had I flown over the place, marveling at the flowers. Indeed, I had gathered honey from the honeysuckle that climbed on the walls of his house and from the crêpe-myrtle hard by. But the roses—ah, the roses! I loved to drop into their hearts and to breathe the sweet breath of their lives. So again, without thinking, I flew down and down until I reached the garden and sank into a rose to rest. I felt tired, ever so tired. When I emerged there was the Master fondling a rose; I circled slowly past him and around him. He saw me at once, and a tender look came into his eyes. Reluctantly I left him caressing his roses, and flew rapidly home.

“I know just about what happened,” he ventured, when he had expressed his joy at seeing me, for he knew that I had been on duty and that a number of the guards had been lost. “I wept not a little for you. Yes, it was a racoon,” he repeated. “You will remember I told you about them. They are crazy over honey.”

He was deeply interested in the account of my mad and unwilling ride.

Then I told him of my visit to the garden, and of the Master. He made no reply, but presently asked:

“What do you know of the Master?”

“Little—very little.”

“Do you know that lately I’ve been wondering whether I have been fair to him? Once I was perfectly sure that he was an enemy to be fought on all occasions, that he made use of us only for selfish ends. Now I am beginning to think I was wrong. While he has taken our honey, he has always left us enough. Last winter, I am told, he actually brought a lot of honey and gave it to the colonies that had none. Besides, before we came in contact with men, we lived in caves and hollow trees, exposed to all manner of enemies. It is different now.”

We were still busy talking when the signal for work rang through the hive, and both Crip and I made our way to the front. And, as many times before, we rose from the board together and flew at once to the field of broomweed. Side by side we ranged, visiting many of the tiny yellow flowers ere we were laden. Everything was now painfully dry, and it was all too evident that the honey flow was over. Try as hard as we might, we gathered only a few loads a day. And Crip remarked how short the days were and how far into the south the sun had drifted. Then, besides, we were obliged to leave off earlier, on account of the cold.

“The leaves are all turning red and brown and yellow,” said Crip, as we flew homeward. “This is the melancholy time I’ve heard about. Even the wind seems sad and loiters around bush and tree as though he feared his caressing touch might hasten the down-dropping of the stricken leaves. Happy, I’m sad, too.”

I could only answer him that I of all bees was one of the most unhappy. And at the moment I was stricken with a feeling of homesickness, as though I, too, were bound on a journey toward the setting sun, or as though an unmeasured catastrophe impended.

As we neared home we saw the Master and his little Shadow seated by our hive, and near them, sprawling on the ground, the faithful dog. The Master was watching the incoming bees. Well he knew by the burdens they bore the condition of the fields.

“The workers are coming home very light,” remarked the Shadow. “Just a little bread.”

“The season is ended,” murmured the Master. “Soon they will go indoors and rest through the cold. We must come presently and take off the empty uppers, so as to concentrate the heat of the cluster. In that way they will conserve their stores. The cluster, you know, son, is formed by the bees covering over the brood and hanging on to one another so as to keep themselves and the young bees warm.”

Crip and I deposited our loads and then returned to the alighting-board, but the speakers had gone. We could hear the Master singing in his garden; and from a mesquite-tree hard by a mocking-bird answered him. All too soon he ceased; and the bird, after trilling a few wild refrains, as though to coax him to return, dropped into silence. For a time not a sound was heard, then the bird broke out again in a most plaintive song. He seemed to summon his phrases from the depths of despair.

Twilight had now quite engulfed the world. Crip, who had been for a time very still, began to stir restlessly.

“Happy, that is my passing song. How could the bird have known that this very night I shall cleave the air for the last time? Yes, I mean it. Please don’t interrupt me. The year has gone—I have done my work. I am a cripple, and my wings are tattered. I shall be a burden, eating the food that may be needed ere the harvest again is ripe. My time has come—and I must go into the dark. This is the law. Why should not bees fly away and never return? How much grander to pass away on the wing, hushed to sleep by the stars. How poor a thing it is to cling to the combs until death shall drag one down to the earth, there to embarrass one’s brothers.

“My work is done. My body is wrecked, and the golden call echoing from eternity is in my ears. I must go. You, Happy, have much to do ere your time shall come. But you will face life bravely.

“How can I thank you enough for having saved my life? Do you think I have done well? Have I worked faithfully? Hero, you say? No, not a hero; but I have tried to do the things that came to my hand; and that is all that one can do. That sums up the true meaning of life—service and duty done.

“Hear the bird! What a song for the night! Ah, but what music I shall hear soon when I fly out across the spaces of light! I am ready. I love you. Farewell—farewell.”

Crip had turned about for the last time, and was ready to go, when a heartrending cry woke the innermost caverns of the hive. He staggered a little, for he knew its meaning. I stood puzzled and amazed.

“What is it?” I begged of him.

“The worst of news—our Queen is dead!” he echoed.

“Let us go to her at once.”

In we went, and while I was shaken by the news which I did not fully comprehend, I was sobered and silent. I should probably have had no thought of death at all had I known what lay before us, the midnight ways we were to tread.

A spirit of dread and disaster filled the place and shook us mightily. Crip said never a word.

“I remember you told me once you had lost your Queen-Mother—that was the time I found you in the hive that we robbed. You were going to tell me about it.”

“Yes; but now it is too late—it is terrible. You do not understand—”

At length we came to where she lay asleep on the bottom-board of the house she had graced for so short a space. Around her surged her children, weeping for the queenly dead.

“She had been ill but a few days,” one said.

“She has not been well since the robbery,” added another.

“She was hurt in the fight,” put in a third.

“But she did not complain,” answered another.

Crip and I now in our turn came into the presence of the Queen lying prone on the floor, her wings draped about her. There were present none of the trappings of the dead, nor anything to show that she was not asleep, so peacefully she lay there. I came presently face to face with her, and once I had looked into her eyes I saw that the vision had vanished, that the spirit had gone.

I turned away sick at heart, wailing I know not what black hymn of despair. Crip, too, I had lost, and I feared he had gone on his long journey. I seemed to sink into a bottomless abyss.

Soon I had partially recovered my composure. The commotion which had swept the colony slowly subsided, although there still ran an undercurrent of anxiety. What should we do? That part of the intelligence of the bee which has to grapple with such emergencies had been active on the instant.

“The Queen is dead—long live the Queen,” was the low, reverential chorus.

“Three Queens have been ordained,” ran the cry.

Without knowing why, I hurried to the place which had been chosen for the wax-cell palaces—and there was Crip! He appeared to be the leader, and I was overjoyed to see him.

“You’ve found something more to do,” I said to him. “I’m so glad.”

“You see, I’m one of the oldest—”

“Don’t look so dejected,” Crip volunteered to those about him. “Hurry—hurry! Soon we shall have another Queen to reign over us.”

And now magic began to intervene—or miracle. Three cells with three tiny larvæ, two days old, were selected, and over these the great cell-palaces were erected. But more mysterious was the feeding of these tiny things, which under normal conditions would emerge workers. Think, then, of the transformation which will produce a Queen! Thanks to a secret buried in the heart of the bee, the worker, it is supposed, is converted, through feeding, into a Queen. Crip told me all this in his cheerful way; and he assumed so much importance in looking after the destinies of the three royal personages, that once or twice I was irritated at his conduct.

“Why three Queens?” I inquired, one day. “We need only one.”

“To make sure that one will survive. The bee takes no chance where it can be avoided.”

The embryonic Queens grew rapidly, and in due season the doors of the palaces were sealed, not to be broken until her ladyship herself should choose to bite her way to the light.

The days were now being counted, even the hours, against the time when She would appear! Once more a little life was manifest in the hive. Workers went scouring the country for forage, and every bee found something to do, so happy were they in anticipation of the coming event.

The Master, too, had shown much interest in us. On one of the early days of our trouble, in passing, he had discovered our condition.

“They have lost their Queen,” he said to the little Shadow. “You can tell that by their movements. Everything is now in confusion. Let us see whether they have eggs or young larvæ available for the making of a Queen.”

With that he opened our hive and found the queen-cells.

“Here are cells already,” he commented, a gleam of satisfaction on his grave face.

“Let me see!” cried the Shadow, poking a little, curious face around a corner of the hive.

The Master knew at a glance the age of the Queens, for the cells had not been sealed; he knew that on such a day one would come forth amid the acclaim of a colony which had languished between hope and fear—life and death. So now, from day to day, with his little Shadow, he passed, pausing in front of the hive long enough to discover whether the great event had occurred.

It was on a day golden with a sun steeped in the waning glory of an Indian summer that the Queen emerged and took her throne. Crip and I had gone to the lake for a load of water, and we should probably not have missed the event had we not, out of curiosity, returned by the hollow tree which our brothers of the swarm had occupied. We flew up to the very entrance; the workers were filing past in a great stream, humming a note of content.

“They will survive,” I said to Crip. “The season has been a late one, and they must have gathered ample stores.”

We were in jubilant mood, on account of this discovery, which chimed in perfectly with conditions at home, for even before we alighted the sound of rejoicing reached us.

“A Queen has been born! A Queen! A Queen!”

We found a throng mad with rejoicings. Crip and I edged our way in, eager to pay our homage, thrilling at the thought that a new lease of life for the colony had been vouchsafed. We reached the place of the palace-cells, only to find them in ruins. Excited bees were razing the last buttresses, while echoing from all sides were: “A new mother has come! A Queen!” Presently two beautiful Queens were led to execution, for one had been crowned—and one only might rule the hive.

Order was restored, and things went normally until the nuptial day. In the life of the colony there is no equally vital event. Destiny waits on the mating of the Queen.

On a wonderfully fine, warm day, at the noon hour, she made ready for flight. Already in the air could be heard the roar of the drones, that groped about in search of the queenly presence. And now from the alighting-board she rose into the crystal blue. Crip and I, for no reason, followed, not near enough, however, to encroach on the sacred precincts. Higher and higher she climbed, now pursued by some scores of drones. Round and round in mazy flight they whirled until the heavens seemed dizzy, and the ultimate moment had arrived, when a yellow flash crossed the sky and fluttered in their midst—a bee-bird.

“Fly for your life!” a drone cried. “Fly—fly!”

A moment later it was all over, and a silent doomed procession dropped earthward—the Queen was missing—the bee-bird had caught her.

The news spread instantly. I had been among the first to make report of it.

“We shall all die together now,” said Crip, in dejection. “It is only a matter of days. We have no eggs, no larvæ, and may not rear another mother. Alas—alas!”

Several days passed, when one morning a great cry rang through the hive that eggs had been found and that queen-cells had been started. It was a strange and pathetic mystery, for we knew that we had no Queen, and yet exulted over the finding of eggs.

Still hoping beyond hope, we tried to create a Queen from the eggs—all in vain. The eggs we now found deposited freely—one, two, or half-a-dozen in a cell—were the eggs of an impostor, a would-be Queen, called a fertile worker.

Strangely enough, too, we began to work in a half-hearted way, gathering honey, feeding the brood of the impostor, and yet we knew or seemed to know that there would emerge but worthless drones. Hope still lingered in our hearts, but daily it grew more faint until despair overcame us.

One morning Crip and I were brooding over our affairs when we saw the Master and his Shadow approaching. They stopped near us.

“Something has happened,” said the Master; “something is wrong. We do not need the smoker. Here, son, lend me a hand!”

“A fertile worker—an impostor!” he exclaimed, on lifting up a frame from the brood-chamber. “See those eggs dropped haphazard! A Queen never does that.”

“Why, there are six in one cell!” cried the Shadow.

“Run, son, and bring me that Italian Queen in the new cage.”

In a few minutes the cry of a Queen rang through the hive. Crip and I flew toward it, and presently paused beside the trap which contained a most beautiful Queen. But she was not our Queen, and now a riot was started. “Kill her—kill her!” broke on all sides. While Crip and I took no part, we entered no protest—we stood almost alone.

Over the cage, biting and clawing, a mob of bees, incited partly by the impostor, endeavored to reach the royal personage. They meant to kill her; first, because she was not of our tribe; secondly, because the impostor had come to own an ascendency over the colony. It was a strange fate, as Crip explained, that we should cling to an impostor and die rather than bring an alien to reign over us. But Crip and I were thinking, and so were many of our little brothers. Crip, on occasion, now gave her food through the wire screen; while I found it convenient to hang about the place. In the mean time the impostor spread her vile brood over the hive, and kept up her conspiracy against the Queen the Master had given us.

Several days passed, and the Master, returning, found what he thought a reconciliation. He opened the cage and out walked the most beautiful Queen I had ever seen, except my own Queen-Mother. Instantly, however, a troop of hostile bees, evidently led by the impostor, fell upon her, and in a moment she was in the center of a “ball” and being slowly crushed to death.

The Master was watching, however, and quickly rescued her and restored her to the cage.

“They are not ready to receive her, son,” he said. “In fact, unless we can destroy the fertile worker, that horrid impostor, we may not succeed.”

“I’ve been thinking,” said Crip, to me that night as we stood by the cage and listened to the regal call of the Queen, “that I shall fight the first bee that comes near her.”

“And so shall I.”

Crip had just given her some honey, and was standing near her on the screen when an ugly bee, unusually large, came up and caught hold of one of her legs which had protruded through the meshes of the cage. He laid hold of it and pulled it with all his might, and the Queen began to cry with pain, when Crip rushed to the rescue.

A terrific battle ensued. I tried to help, and did seize the vicious bee by one wing, only to be kicked off. But Crip had grappled him in his vise-like mandibles, and I saw it was a battle to the death. Over and over they whirled, finally to fall to the bottom of the hive—still fighting. I followed as fast as I might, and when I reached where they lay they had ceased to struggle—both were dead.

A lance wound in his heart had finished my beloved friend.

“Crip—Crip!” I cried aloud; but got no answer. One little foot moved a few times, then was still.

Almost simultaneously an alarm sounded. The impostor had disappeared.

I shook with an unrestrained emotion. “We are saved,” I thought.

“Where is our Queen? The Queen is gone!” they called.

A wild rush of bees set the hive in pandemonium. Finally one began to cry: “Here she is—she is dead.”

“Dead—dead!” rose loud over the place.

They were wailing over the lifeless body of the impostor, while I stood broken-hearted beside my Crip, who, at the sacrifice of his life, had redeemed that of the colony.