A Bee-Master.
Tunbridge Wells.
The Bee-master's Sermon.
_To the Editor of "The Times."_
Sir,--The object of my letters has been to open up to the cottager
a means of revenue very agreeable, but very much neglected or
mismanaged. I have directed your attention to bee-keeping, not as a
fancy pursuit, or as an interesting entomological investigation, but
as a practical and real work. Hence I have not discussed a variety of
toys used as bee-hives, very pretty and very tasteful to the eye of
a sentimental aparian, but so bothering to the bees that they wish
such houses were at the bottom of the sea. Simplicity of structure,
directness of use, and availableness for deprivation of honey, and yet
preservation of the honey-makers, ought to be the guiding law. Bees
don't like to be paid too many, too obsequious, or too patronising
attentions. I want, however, in this closing letter to turn my largest
hive into a pulpit, and to preach a short apiarian homily to English
cottagers, which I know they will read, and hope they will "mark,
learn, and inwardly digest."
1. They may carry from the hive to the cottage-hearth a lesson of
industry. During work the bees are so intensely absorbed in their
duty, that they ignore every distracting and diverging object and
interest. They have learnt well a text their masters would do well to
copy: "Not slothful in business." There is no getting on in this world
of ours without hard work. It is not work and plenty of it that kills
people, but worry.
2. Bees teach a lesson of loyalty. They are monarchical by conviction
and in practice. They love a queen, whose sovereignty is motherhood,
and whose service is perfect freedom. They detest your republics, and
democracies, and radicalism in all its phases.
3. Bees are immensely attached to their homes. They are "keepers at
home." No mother of a family gets on by gadding about and gossiping
from house to house.
4. Bees are models of cleanliness. The care with which they remove
filth of all kinds is something remarkable. They plainly believe
what many Christians say, "cleanliness is nearest to godliness." The
cottager cannot in this matter do better than follow the example of
these admirable sanitary philosophers.
5. Bees set a beautiful example of Christian sympathy. I have seen a
wounded bee, accidentally hurt, carried out from the hive and laid
tenderly on the bee-board in the warm sunshine. One bee would lick
the sufferer with his tongue from head to foot; another would roll
him over and over in the sunshine; and at sunset they would carry him
in to his sick bed. I do not complain of want of such sympathy among
the poor. I have seen much of it in the homes of the most destitute,
and witnessed personal attentions and sacrifices and services in a
district surrounding Brewer's-court ragged schools, which have never
been exceeded, if equalled, in the houses of the great.
6. Bees are very fond of fresh air. A hive is one of the best
ventilated homes; and I have some doubt about the wisdom or success
of the various arrangements made by some bee-masters for increasing
the ventilation of their hives. In a hot and sultry day I have seen
successive lines of bees take up their position at the mouth of the
hive, and, joining the tips of their wings, work these fanners for ten
minutes, and then retire and let the second parallel line come to the
front and continue the same process. This example is not efficiently
followed in city or cottage. People who are most careful about what
they eat and drink and put into their stomachs, are utterly careless
what they allow to enter their lungs. Now, the truth is, it is easier
to poison a man through his lungs than through his stomach. My bees
would die in a London bed-room in twelve hours.
7. Bees are very early risers. The first ray of sunshine is their
matin bell, and by seven o'clock P.M. they are most of them at home.
People that live long and are healthy differ in many of their habits,
but generally agree in being early risers. Early light has sanitary
as well as photographic influences, which post-meridian light is a
stranger to. "Early to bed and early up" is an admirable maxim--an
axiom among bees, and it should be a habit among rational men.
8. Bees are peaceful and peacemakers. This will appear a hasty
statement to all who remember that bees have stings. But a little
thought will justify what I say. Bees never give way to aggressive
warfare. They never attack those who do not attack their queen or
their homestead. Their stings are purely defensive. This is a very
curious fact, and very suggestive also. If they had no stings at all,
they would be an argument for the Peace Society. But as it is, they
prove that the best defence of home is a good preparation to repel the
aggressor. When, therefore, Mr. Bright preaches the duty of breaking
up the navy and disbanding the army, it would be the conduct of a
great hornet impressing on bees the duty of extracting their stings.
Were the bees such simpletons as to listen to his plausible logic, and
give up their stings, they would be surrounded by swarms of wasps, who
would very soon make them give up their honey. As if to teach the bees
that their weapons are to be used only in the last extremity, every
bee knows that the use of his sting is followed by its inevitable loss
and his destruction. It sticks where it strikes, and the violence
done to the bee ends always in death. While admiring Mr. Bright's love
of peace, I hope every bee-keeper in England will prefer the bees' way
of maintaining it. So sweet and short is a bee-master's sermon.
I think I have shown in these letters that morals, money, country, and
enjoyment may all be helped a little by keeping bees; and, therefore,
that I have done some good by directing attention to these "great and
marvellous works" of One who still gives his care to a bee-hive and to
Buckingham Palace.