Honey is not the only substance that bees carry home to the hive. They
also collect in considerable quantities the fecundating dust or pollen
of flowers. If the long tongue is specially adapted for sucking up the
one, the hind legs, supplied with a brush of hair, are equally fitted
for collecting and conveying the other. When the bee visits the flower
in question it dives deep down among the dust-like powder, and comes out
again, all covered from head to foot, like a miller well dusted with his
meal. But applying the brush of hair which it carries for the purpose,
it speedily brushes the pollen all down in the form of a tiny ball, and
carries it home on its hind legs to be used in the economy of the hive.
But what is it for? To make _bee-bread_ for the young bees. The
hexagonal cells are not all used for the storage of honey. A very large
proportion of the comb is set apart for the hatching of the young ones.
And these infant bees are voracious eaters. Like other little children,
they have to be carefully nursed and attended to, and the sagacious
nurses have quite enough to do in providing them with the right kind of
food. Ordinary honey is too strong for their infantile digestion, and
therefore the honey is mixed with the pollen to render it a fit
nourishment for these fastidious babies.
This is the only object the _bees_ have in collecting the pollen; but it
is not the only end they serve in the plan of the great Creator.
Unknown to themselves they are doing a great work in the propagating of
flowers. The fertilising dust of one flower must be conveyed to the
corresponding organs of another; and the bee like a village postman, is
brought in to convey the necessary love-tokens. Apart from this service
rendered by the bee, the wild flowers that deck the fields and highways
would soon be conspicuous by their absence.
We cannot, then, go back to the point from which we started, and say
that the bee can only be regarded as a savage and dangerous annoyance.
It fills a very important place in the economy of nature. As the maker
of wax it is the prince of mathematicians; as the gatherer of _honey_ it
is the bringer of many choice blessings; and as the collector and
distributer of _pollen_ it is at once a sagacious nurse, and one who
dispenses a harvest, "sowing the To-be." Well may we sit at its hive
and learn wisdom.
*The Swallow.*
"As the bird by wandering, as the swallow by flying, so the curse
causeless shall not come."--Prov. xxvi. 2.
The swallow is the bird of the summer. Like the coming of the cuckoo
itself, the arrival of the swallow is anxiously waited for as the
harbinger of warmer days. And thus we have the beautiful fancy
connected with the little flower Celandine. The name means "a swallow,"
and was applied to the tiny plant because it was supposed to open its
petals when the swallows appeared in spring, and to close them and die
when they disappeared in autumn. Whether the flowers hasten to welcome
the little bird or not, there are many human hearts that leap up with
joy at the sight of the airy wanderer, and hail it as the bird of
freedom--the herald and pledge of the summer.