POOR little bee! It spends its days in gathering nectar from the flowers to make into honey,—just to have some bigger and stronger creature come along and rob it of the fruits of its hard labor.

It is not only man who has a sweet tooth; a great many other animals are just as fond of honey as is he, and will do almost anything to obtain it; that is, anything but work for it. For I very much doubt if so much honey would be eaten if those who like it had to make it, even supposing that they knew how to make it.

Just think of it! Honey is chiefly sugar, and the nectar from over three million flower-tubes is required to make one pound of sugar. Or, suppose one very industrious little bee should decide to make enough honey to contain a pound of sugar. It would have to sip the nectar from fifty thousand heads of clover in order to obtain the necessary quantity.

And yet after a bee colony has taken an immense amount of trouble to lay away a goodly supply of sweets for the little bees, a great bear, perhaps, will thrust his shaggy paw into the nest and pull out layer after layer of the white comb, dripping with thick golden honey, and swallow them down, like the gluttonous fellow that he is. And in return the poor bees can only sting, which can not be any real satisfaction to them; for though they may hurt the creature stung, they end their own lives in the act.

In a great many countries, bees are kept for their honey, just as cows are kept for their milk, and are well cared for; but where people are too lazy or too savage to keep bees, it is usually the custom to steal honey from the wild bees and often to kill most of the poor little creatures at the same time. Usually, however, the bees are stupefied by the smoke, so that they will not sting while the honey is being removed.

Generally, wild honey-bees build their nests in the hollows of trees, but there is a species in India that builds great nests hanging from the branches of high trees. Some of these nests are so large that they can be seen more than a mile away. Of course such a nest has quantities of honey in it. Some of the natives of that part of the world live the whole year long upon the proceeds of honey stolen from these hanging hives. When a man discovers a nest, he provides himself with a smoking torch and climbs the tree. He stupefies some of the bees, suffocates others, and burns the rest. Then he

steals the honey-laden comb and lowers it by means of a cord to the ground.

In Africa the bees have a very hard time; for there man has a sharp-eyed, active little friend to help him find the carefully hidden honey. This little friend is a bird,- a rascally, shiftless fellow, that not only fails to build a home for its little ones, but even goes so far as to make other birds have all the trouble and worry of bringing up and feeding them. Like the cuckoo, it puts its eggs in the nests of other birds.

The "honey-guide,” as it is called, is exceedingly fond of honey; or, if it can not have that, is very well satisfied with young bees. It is only about the size of a lark, and so is not specially fitted for encountering a swarm of bees fighting in defense of their home. Once in a while, it tries to rob a nest, but it is usually well punished for doing so. The little bees seem to know that their stings can not injure the feather-covered body of the bird, and accordingly they direct their attacks at the eyes of the robber; and if the bird does not escape in time, it will be blinded, and so perish of starvation.

However, the honey-guide is seldom so foolish as to run any such risk. It prefers to have some one else steal the honey, and is content with a small portion for its share. It is said sometimes to guide the ratel, an animal of the weasel family, to the nest; and it certainly often does wait near by, while the ratel, which is very fond of both bees and honey, rifles the nest. Before the honey is all gone, little Honey-guide usually contrives to have a taste.

Whether the bird guides the ratel or not, it unquestionably does guide men to the bees' nests. When it has found a nest, it darts away in search of a man. As soon as it sees one, it hovers over him, flies about his head, perches near him, or flutters here and there in front of him, all the time chattering vigorously. The native knows in a moment what the little bird means; and as he loves honey as a child does candy, only something that is very important will prevent his accepting the honey-guide's invitation. When he is ready to follow, he whistles; and the bird seems to understand the signal, for it at once flies on, for a short distance and waits till the man is near, and then flies on a few yards farther. In this way the bird leads the man until the nest is reached. Then it suddenly changes its twitter for a peculiar note, and either hovers over the nest for a moment,

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or complacently sits down and lets the man find the nest, as best he can.

When it is found, the bees are smoked out with a torch or with a fire of leaves, according to the height of the nest from the ground A small portion of the honey is given to the bird as its share of the plunder. If the little fellow has had honey enough, it disappears; but if, as is usually the case, it receives only enough to whet its appetite, it will lead to another nest, and sometimes even to a third. Once in a while, a man who is running after the little bird finds himself suddenly face to face with a wild beast or serpent. This is likely enough in a country that is so well supplied with both. But the natives say that the honey-guide is naturally wicked, and that it sometimes leads unsuspecting men into traps for the mere pleasure of villainy. Careful observers, however, maintain that this is not true.

In Australia, where there is no little bird to find honey for him, the native adopts a very peculiar plan for discovering the hidden sweets. He knows that bees never wander very far from home, seldom more than two miles; and he also knows that when a bee is laden with honey it makes, as nearly as possible, a straight line for home. All that is necessary, then, is to find a bee that is well laden and follow it. But that is more easily said than done; for although it is quite easy to determine whether the bee has a full cargo, it is difficult to follow it. Any boy who has tried to follow the big and gaycolored bumble-bee to its nest knows how great a task it is. But that is a mere trifle to following the sober little honey-bee, which can be lost, like a dream, against

a gray-colored hill-side. Moreover, a half-dozen other bees may cross its path, and then you can imagine how difficult it would become to distinguish the homeward-bound bee from the others. That sort of a wild-bee chase would be little better than the traditional wild-goose chase.

In order to be followed, the bee must have a distinguishing mark that can be easily seen, and with such a badge, the Australian provides it. He simply gums a small tuft of white cotton to the bee's back, and is thus enabled to follow it with comparative ease. A bee carrying a load of honey, and with a miniature bale of cotton on its back, can not fly very swiftly.

But the question now comes up, how is the cotton to be put upon the bee's back? The gum is quickly found-it is on almost any tree; the cotton grows right at hand. The bee, too, is found in almost any sweet flower, buried head first in the dusty pollen, drinking in the nectar and showing quite plainly whether its honey-sac is full or empty. It moves a little in its eager haste to secure the delicious liquid, but perhaps a quick dab will fasten the cotton on its back.-Do not try it. As the little boy told his mother, the bee is a very "quick kicker."

Watch the Australian, and he a very stupid fellow, too, in most things. He fills his mouth with water, has his snowy tuft of cotton ready gummed, finds his bee, gently drenches it with water spurted from his mouth, picks it up while it is still indignantly shaking itself free from the water which clogs its wings, and with a dexterous touch he affixes in a instant the tell-tale cotton.

Very much out of patience, no doubt, with the sudden and unexpected rain-storm, the bee rubs off the tiny drops from its wings, tries them, rubs again, and soon-buzz! buzz! away it goes, unconsciously leading destruction and pillage to its happy home;

for a few yards behind it runs the honey-hungry savage, his vigilant eye fixed on the moving white speck, which is to carry him to so sweet a destination.

We, who use millions of pounds of sugar and hundreds of thousands of pounds of honey every year, need not be surprised that the savage, who has only honey for sweetness, should be eager to use every effort to obtain it. The human family doubtless needs a great deal of sweetening, for vast quantities of honey and sugar are used all over the world.

In ancient times honey was almost the only sweetening substance used, and it was consequently very highly valued. The promised land was described to the Israelites as flowing with milk and honey, and that, to them, was as much as a land full of gold to the men of these times. And it was not merely what is called "a figure of speech " to say that Palestine flowed with milk and honey, for where cows thrive, bees thrive; and to this day there is no part of the world where honey is so plentiful as in Palestine.

In Judea, particularly, there are so many wild bees, that many of the inhabitants gain a livelihood simply by gathering honey from the crevices in rocks and hollows in trees. One traveler says that the trees in the forests in the Holy Land do, in truth, "flow" with honey, for the fat combs full of it hang from the trees on every hand.

Honey is good, but it is not safe to eat every kind of honey you may chance to find; for, honey made from poisonous flowers is usually poisonous also. This poisonous honey is found in all parts of the world, and accordingly, when you find a nest of wild bees, look carefully about and see if there are many poisonous flowers growing in the neighborhood. If so, be resolute, and abstain from eating the honey. For thus you will be good to yourself and to the hard-working bees, as well.