reports of his handling them with such
impunity, and the same incredulity was expressed
of the statement made in the Memoires of the
Due de Bru, Director of the French Company
of Senegal, who there relates the case of a
man in Senegal, who was known as the bee-
master in consequence of his doing precisely the
same things with them as Wildman. The latter,
however, was more fortunate than he, probably,
for the Society of Arts, in consideration of his
services in promoting the culture of bees, made
him a present of one hundred guineas. It
would not be advisable for every man who may
venture on keeping bees to handle them in this
way. A Mr. Morant, living at Grange-lane,
Southwark, at a time when Southwark had not
so many houses in it as it has now, was stung
to death in his garden by his own bees. These
insects also have a very keen smell, and there
are some men for whom they have a special
dislike, and whom they will always sting if they
approach their hives. This belief is carried to
a fanciful extent by some bee-keepers; they say
that any person approaching the hive whose
person or dress is perfumed is certain to be
stung, for the bees hold all odours in
abhorrence. If this were true, one might well ask
how they manage to endure the smell of the
flowers from which they gather the materials
of which they make their honey. It is either
Livy or Pliny who goes further than this,
and avers that it is on moral grounds the bee
forms his estimate of mankind; that they object
to men whose actions are impure generally,
and have an especial antipathy to thieves.
It is in reality impossible to explain why
they should favour one individual more than
another, but they certainly do so; it is
related of a Duchess of Rutland that a swarm
followed her all the way from the country to
a house in Berkeley-square, where they were
hived.

Accident has sometimes led to what Wildman
did with design. A woman named Bennet,
living near Birmingham, was beating a frying-
pan with a key to keep the swarm from going
away, when they all at once settled upon her
head, neck, and shoulders. Luckily for her she
was a woman of nerve, and, instead of making
efforts to brush them off, which would have
probably caused her to be stung to death, she
kept quiet, notwithstanding an occasional sting
from bees which had crawled underneath her
clothes, and which were probably irritated from
being unable to get out. When the evening
came, they were hived in the usual way. It is
not advisable to get into the way of bees when
they are swarming, for at such times they are
frequently very irritable. A swarm of them
hovered about a fine mastiff who was chained to
a kennel, and stung him so severely that he
died. It would seem hardly possible for them
to sting him through his coat, but in his anger
he must have snapped at them, and so gave
them an opportunity of entering his mouth, for,
after his death, many were found in his mouth
and throat.

Of the rapidity with which bees work even
under unfavourable circumstances, we have a
very precise account related by Swammerdam.
He hived a swarm on the 25th of July, and on the
31st of the same month he killed them all. The
weather had been very bad in the interval, and
he did not therefore expect to find they had
done much. He first counted the number of
bees, and found there were five thousand six
hundred and sixty-nine, all of which were
workers, with the exception of the queen and
thirty-three males. They had built in this short
time three thousand three hundred and ninety-
two complete cells for the workers, forty-five of
which contained eggs, and one hundred and fifty
newly-hatched worms; sixty-two cells were
filled with bee-bread, and two hundred and
thirty-six had contained honey, which, however,
had been eaten.

The queens, inveterate as they are against
each other, will not sting each other simultaneously.
Two placed face to face, rushed together
with the greatest fury, but so dexterous
were they, and so well matched, that neither
had the advantage, both being in a position to
give the death-blow. No sooner, however, did
their bellies come in contact, than, instead of
thrusting their stings into each other, they
released their grip with the greatest precipitation,
and retreated as fast as they could in opposite
directions, as though the fear of death was as
strong in them as in a millionnaire. Apparently
their impulse was to escape, and not to renew
the conflict, but a number of workers collected
round each, seized them by their legs, and
compelled them to remain in the space which had
been vacated for the combat. The queens
looked at each other for a short space, and then
made a second rush, but they were equally wary,
and their grip was the same as on the first occasion,
and they again separated with the same
manifestation of horror, endeavouring to get as
far apart as possible, but were again checked by
the bees who watched the fight. Brought in
presence once more, one of them suddenly
changed her mode of attack, and succeeded in
seizing her antagonist by the wing, and bending
her body so as to bring her extremity underneath
her, she plunged her sting into her belly,
and stretched her victim dead. The same
experiment was repeated with a fertile and a virgin
queen. The latter darted at the other with the
fiercest determination, and succeeded in mounting
on her back, but her efforts to sting while
in this position were ineffectual, from the scales
on her opponent's sides preventing the weapon
from penetrating. They then drew apart a
short distance, and in the next charge it was
the matron who got into this position, but, being
equally unable to profit by it, she dismounted
and moved away. A longer pause ensued before
they renewed the attack a third time, the other
bees wedging them in and waiting with the most
perfect calmness for the termination of the
encounter, to all appearance indifferent whether
their own queen or the interloper was the victor,
but quite determined that one of them should