第126章

Bees seem to take a pleasure in listening to a rattling noise; and consequently men say that they can muster them into a hive by rattling with crockery or stones; it is uncertain, however, whether or no they can hear the noise at all and also whether their procedure is due to pleasure or alarm. They expel from the hive all idlers and unthrifts. As has been said, they differentiate their work; some make wax, some make honey, some make bee-bread, some shape and mould combs, some bring water to the cells and mingle it with the honey, some engage in out-of-door work. At early dawn they make no noise, until some one particular bee makes a buzzing noise two or three times and thereby awakes the rest; hereupon they all fly in a body to work. By and by they return and at first are noisy; then the noise gradually decreases, until at last some one bee flies round about, making a buzzing noise, and apparently calling on the others to go to sleep; then all of a sudden there is a dead silence.

The hive is known to be in good condition if the noise heard within it is loud, and if the bees make a flutter as they go out and in; for at this time they are constructing brood-cells. They suffer most from hunger when they recommence work after winter. They become somewhat lazy if the bee-keeper, in robbing the hive, leave behind too much honey; still one should leave cells numerous in proportion to the population, for the bees work in a spiritless way if too few combs are left. They become idle also, as being dispirited, if the hive be too big. A hive yields to the bee-keeper six or nine pints of honey; a prosperous hive will yield twelve or fifteen pints, exceptionally good hives eighteen. Sheep and, as has been said, wasps are enemies to the bees. Bee-keepers entrap the latter, by putting a flat dish on the ground with pieces of meat on it; when a number of the wasps settle on it, they cover them with a lid and put the dish and its contents on the fire. It is a good thing to have a few drones in a hive, as their presence increases the industry of the workers. Bees can tell the approach of rough weather or of rain; and the proof is that they will not fly away, but even while it is as yet fine they go fluttering about within a restricted space, and the bee-keeper knows from this that they are expecting bad weather. When the bees inside the hive hang clustering to one another, it is a sign that the swarm is intending to quit; consequently, occasion, when a bee-keepers, on seeing this, besprinkle the hive with sweet wine. It is advisable to plant about the hives pear-trees, beans, Median-grass, Syrian-grass, yellow pulse, myrtle, poppies, creeping-thyme, and almond-trees.

Some bee-keepers sprinkle their bees with flour, and can distinguish them from others when they are at work out of doors. If the spring be late, or if there be drought or blight, then grubs are all the fewer in the hives. So much for the habits of bees.

Of wasps, there are two kinds. Of these kinds one is wild and scarce, lives on the mountains, engenders grubs not underground but on oak-trees, is larger, longer, and blacker than the other kind, is invariably speckled and furnished with a sting, and is remarkably courageous. The pain from its sting is more severe than that caused by the others, for the instrument that causes the pain is larger, in proportion to its own larger size. These wild live over into a second year, and in winter time, when oaks have been in course of felling, they may be seen coming out and flying away. They lie concealed during the winter, and live in the interior of logs of wood.