By Carl Ewald
The farmer opened his hive. "Off with you!" he said to the Bees. "The sun is shining, and everywhere the flowers are coming out, so that it is a joy to see them. Get to work, and gather a good lot of honey for me to sell to the shopkeeper in the autumn. 'Many a streamlet makes a river,' and you know these are bad times for farmers."
"What does that matter to us?" said the Bees. But all the same they flew out; for they had been sitting all the winter in the hive, and they longed for a breath of fresh air. They hummed and buzzed, they stretched their legs, they tried their wings. They swarmed out in all directions; they crawled up and down the hive; they flew off to the flowers and bushes, or wandered all around on the ground. There were hundreds and hundreds of them.
Last of all came the Queen. She was bigger than the others, and it was she who ruled the hive. "Stop your nonsense, little children," she said, "and set to work and do something. A good Bee does not idle, but turns to with a will and makes good use of its time."
So she divided them into parties and set them to work. "You over there, fly out and see if there is any honey in the flowers. The others can collect flower-dust, and when you come home give it in smartly to the old Bees in the hive."
Away they flew at once. But all the very young ones stayed behind. They made the last party, for they had never been out with the others. "What areweto do?" they asked.
"You! you must perspire," said the Queen. "One, two, three! Then we can begin our work." And they perspired as well as they had learned to, and the prettiest yellow wax came out of their bodies.
"Good!" said the Queen. "Now we will begin to build." The old Bees took the wax, and began to build a number of little six-sided cells, all alike and close up to one another. All the time they were building, the others came flying in with flower-dust and honey, which they laid at the Queen's feet.
"We can now knead the dough," she said. "But first put a little honey in—that makes it taste so much better." They kneaded and kneaded, and before very long they had made some pretty little loaves of Bee bread, which they carried into the cells. "Now let us go on with the building," commanded the Queen Bee, and they perspired wax and built for all they were worth.
"And nowmywork begins," said the Queen, and she heaved a deep sigh; for her work was the hardest work of all. She sat down in the middle of the hive and began to lay her eggs. She laid great heaps of them, and the Bees were kept very busy running with the little eggs in their mouths and carrying them into the new cells. Each egg had a little cell to itself; and when they had all been put in their places, the Queen gave orders to fix doors to all the cells and shut them fast.
"Good!" she said, when this was done. "I want you now to build me ten fine big rooms in the out-of-the-way parts of the hive."
The Bees had them ready in no time, and then the Queen laid ten pretty eggs, one in each of the big rooms, and the doors were fixed as before. Every day the Bees flew in and out, gathering great heaps of honey and flower-dust; but in the evening, when their work was done, they would open the doors just a crack and have a peep at the eggs.
"Take care," the Queen said one day. "They are coming!" And all the eggs burst at once, and in every cell lay a pretty little Bee Baby.
"What funny creatures!" said the young Bees. "They have no eyes, and where are their legs and wings?"
"They are Grubs," said the Queen. "You simpletons looked just like that yourselves once upon a time. One must be a Grub before one can become a Bee. Be quick now, and give them something to eat." The Bees bestirred themselves to feed the little ones, but they were not equally kind to them all. The ten, however, that lay in the large cells got as much to eat as ever they wanted, and every day a great quantity of honey was carried in to them.
"They are Princesses," said the Queen, "so you must treat them well. The others you can stint; they are only working people, and they must accustom themselves to be content with what they can get." And every morning the poor little wretches got a little piece of Bee bread and nothing more, and with that they had to be satisfied, though they were ever so hungry.
In one of the little six-sided cells close by the Princesses' chambers lay a little tiny Grub. She was the youngest of them all, and only just come out of the egg. She could not see, but she could plainly hear the grown-up Bees talking outside, and for a while she lay quite still and kept her thoughts to herself. All at once she said out loud, "I could eat a little more," and she knocked at her door.
"You have had enough for to-day," answered the old Bee who was appointed to be head Bee Nurse, creeping up and down in the passage outside.
"Maybe, but I am hungry!" shouted the little Grub. "I will go into one of the Princesses' chambers; I have not room to stir here."
"Just listen to her!" said the old Bee mockingly. "One would think by the demands she makes that she was a fine little Princess. You are born to toil and drudge, my little friend. You are a mere working Bee, and you will never be anything else all your days."
"But I want to be Queen!" cried the Grub, and thumped on the door. Of course the old Bee did not answer such nonsense, but went on to the others. From every side they were calling out for more food, and the little Grub could hear it all.
"It is hard, though," she thought, "that we should have to be so hungry." And then she knocked on the Princess' wall and called to her, "Give me a little of your honey. Let me come into your chamber. I am lying here so hungry, and I am just as good as you."
"Are you? Just you wait till I am a reigning Queen," said the Princess. "You may be sure that when that time comes I shall not forget your impertinence." But she had scarcely said this before the other Princesses began to cry out in the most dreadful manner.
"You're not going to be Queen!Ishall be Queen!Ishall be Queen!" they shrieked all together, and they began to knock on the walls and make a frightful disturbance.
The head Bee Nurse came running up in an instant and opened the doors. "What are your graces' orders?" she asked, dropping a curtsy and scraping the ground with her feet.
"More honey!" they shouted, all in one voice. "But me first—me first. I am the one who is to be queen."
"In a moment, in a moment, your graces," she answered, and ran off as fast as her six legs could carry her. She soon came back with many other Bees. They were dragging ever so much honey, which they crammed down the cross little Princesses' throats. And then they got them to hold their tongues and lie still and rest.
But the little Grub lay awake, thinking over what had happened. She longed so much for some honey that she began to shake the door again. "Give me some honey! I can't stand it any longer. I am just as good as the others."
The old Bee tried to hush her. "Hold your tongue, little bawler!The Queen's coming." And at the same moment the Queen Bee came.
"Go your ways," she said to the Bees; "I wish to be alone."
For a long time she stood in silence before the Princesses' chambers. "Now they are lying there asleep," she said at last. "From morning till evening they do nothing but eat and sleep, and they grow bigger and fatter every day. In a few days they will be full grown, and will creep out of their cells. Then my turn will be over. I know that too well. I have heard the Bees saying to one another that they would like to have a younger and more beautiful Queen, and they will chase me away in disgrace. But I will not submit to it. To-morrow I will kill them all; then I can remain Queen till I die."
Then she went away. But the little Grub had heard all she said.
"Dear me!" she thought; "it is really a pity about the little Princesses. They are certainly very uppish, and they have not been nice to me, but still it would be sad if the wicked Queen killed them. I think I will tell the old growler outside in the passage all about it."
She began once more knocking at the door, and the head Bee Nurse came running up, but this time she was fearfully angry. "You must mind what you are doing, my good Grub," she said. "You are the youngest of them all, and you are the worst for making a noise. Next time I shall tell the Queen."
"First listen to me," said the Grub, and she told her about theQueen's wicked design.
"Good gracious! is that true?" cried the old Nurse, and beat her wings in horror. And without hearing a word more, she hurried off to tell the other Bees.
"I think I deserve a little honey for what I have done," said the little Grub. "But I can now lie down and sleep with a good conscience."
Next evening, when the Queen thought that all the Bees were in bed, she came to kill the Princesses. The Grub could hear her talking aloud to herself. But she was quite afraid of the wicked Queen, and dared not stir. "I hope she won't kill the Princesses," she thought, and squeezed herself nearer to the door to hear what happened.
The Queen looked cautiously round on all sides, and then opened the first of the doors. But at the same moment the Bees swarmed out from all directions, seized her by the legs and wings, and dragged her out. "What is the matter?" she cried. "Are you raising a rebellion?"
"No, your majesty," answered the Bees, with great reverence; "but we know that you are intending to kill the Princesses, andthatyou shall not be allowed to do. What would become of us in the autumn after your majesty's death?"
"Let me go!" cried the Queen, and tried to get away. "I am Queen now anyway, and have the power to do what I like. How do you know that I shall die in the autumn?" But the Bees held her fast, and dragged her outside the hive. There they set her free, but she shook her wings in a passion and said to them,—
"You are disloyal subjects, who are not worth ruling over. I won't stay here an hour longer, but I will go out into the world and build a new nest. Are there any of you who will come with me?"
Some of the old Bees, who had been Grubs at the same time as the Queen, declared that they would follow her. And soon after they flew away.
"Now we have no Queen," said the others, "we must take good care of the Princesses." And so they crammed them with honey from morning till night; and they grew, and grabbed, and squabbled, and made more noise each day than the day before.
As for the little Grub, no one gave a single thought to her.
One morning the doors of the Princesses' chambers flew open, and all ten of them stepped out, beautiful full-grown Queen Bees. The other Bees ran up and gazed at them in admiration. "How pretty they are!" they said. "It is hard to say which is the most beautiful."
"Iam!" one cried.
"You make a mistake," said another, and stabbed her with her sting.
"You are rather conceited," shrieked a third. "I imagine thatIam rather prettier than you are." And immediately they all began calling out at once, and soon after began to fight with one another as hard as ever they could.
The Bees would have liked to separate them, but the old head BeeNurse said to them,—"Let them go on fighting; then we shall seewhich of them is the strongest, and we will choose her to be ourQueen. We can't do with more than one."
At this the Bees formed round in a ring and looked on at the battle. It lasted a long time, and it was fiercely fought. Wings and legs which had been bitten off were flying about in the air, and after some time eight of the Princesses lay dead upon the ground. The two last were still fighting. One of them had lost all her wings, and the other had only four legs left.
"She will be a poor sort of Queen whichever of the two we get," said one of the Bees. "We should have done better to have kept the old one." But she might have spared herself the remark, for in the same moment the Princesses gave each other such a stab with their stings that they both fell dead as a door-nail.
"That is a pretty business!" called the Bees, and ran about among each other in dismay. "Now we have no Queen! What shall we do? What shall we do?"
In despair they crawled about the hive, and did not know which way to turn. But the oldest and cleverest sat in a corner and held a council. For a long time they talked this way and that as to what they should decide on doing in their unhappy circumstances. But at last the head Bee Nurse got a hearing, and said,—"I can tell you how you can get out of the difficulty, if you will but follow my advice. I remember that the same misfortune happened to us in this hive a long time ago. I was then a Grub myself. I lay in my cell, and distinctly heard what took place. All the Princesses had killed one another, and the old Queen had gone out into the world: it was just as it is now. But the Bees took one of us Grubs and laid her in one of the Princesses' cells. They fed her every day with the finest and best honey in the whole hive; and when she was full-grown, she was a charming and good Queen. I can clearly remember the whole affair, for I thought at the time that they might just as well have taken me. But we may do the same thing again. I propose that we act in the same way."
The Bees were delighted, and cried that they would willingly do so, and they ran off at once to fetch a Grub.
"Wait a moment," cried the head Bee Nurse, "and take me with you. At any rate, I will come and help you. Consider now. It must be one of the youngest Grubs, for she must have time to think over her new position. When one has been brought up to be a mere drudge, it is not easy to accustom oneself to wear a crown."
That also seemed to the Bees to be wise, and the old one went on, —"Close by the side of the Princesses' cells lies a little Grub. She is the youngest of them all. She must have learnt a good deal by hearing the Princesses' refined conversation, and I have noticed that she has some character. Besides, it was she who was honourable enough to tell me about the wicked intentions of the old Queen. Let us take her."
At once they went in a solemn procession to the six-sided cell where the little Grub lay. The head Bee Nurse politely knocked at the door, opened it cautiously, and told the Grub what the Bees had decided. At first she could hardly believe her own ears; but when they had carried her carefully into one of the large, delightful chambers, and brought her as much honey as she could eat, she perceived that it was all in earnest.
"So I am to be Queen after all," she said to the head Bee Nurse."You would not believe it, you old growler!"
"I hope that your majesty will forget the rude remarks that I made at the time you lay in the six-sided cell," said the old Bee, with a respectful bow.
"I forgive you," said the new-baked Princess. "Fetch me some more honey."
A little time after the Grub was full grown, and stepped out of her cell as big and as beautiful as the Bees could wish. And besides, she knew how to commando "Away with you!" she said. "We must have more honey for our use in the winter, and you others must perspire more wax. I am thinking of building a new wing to the hive. The new Princesses shall live there next year; it is very unsuitable for them to be so near common Grubs."
"Heyday!" said the Bees to one another. "One would think she had been a Queen ever since she lay in the egg."
"No," said the head Bee Nurse; "that is not so. But she has hadqueenly thoughts, and that is the great thing."
By Albert W. Tolman
"How many bridges have I driven rivets on?" repeated the watchman, reflectively. "Let me see—just forty-seven—no, forty-eight! I forgot the Mogung cantilever. Never in Burma were you? Well, it's the only time I ever went abroad. It was something of a compliment for a young fellow of twenty-two to be sent on his company's first job abroad. I should have liked the trip first rate if Harry Lancy hadn't been going as foreman.
"Harry had risen from the ranks, and at twenty-five was considered one of the company's best men. I'd never worked under him; but I judged he'd be uppish and arbitrary, and knew I shouldn't like him. You notice such things when you've just come of age. As you get older, you begin to think less of your own feelings, and more of doing your work right.
"We landed at Rangoon about May 1st, went by rail to Mandalay, and from there travelled slowly up-country by construction-train to the Mogung Gorge. During the whole journey I didn't speak a hundred words to Lancy. Still, I don't think he suspected I had any grudge against him. If he did, he never let on, but treated me just like the others.
"The gorge was an awful hole, two hundred and fifty feet wide and two hundred deep, with the river dashing white over the ledges at its bottom. It was to be spanned by a cantilever bridge with an intermediate truss.
"We found our work all cut out for us. Every beam and girder was on the ground, numbered and ready. There were plenty of coolies for the ordinary labor. So we got busy at once. A temporary wire suspension-bridge was thrown across above the site of the cantilever, and work begun from both sides at the same time.
"From the outset I had determined to give Lancy no chance for fault-finding, but to have as little to do with him as I possibly could.
"Little by little our beam-trusses pushed out from each bank, and the gap between them grew narrower.
"One thing that interested me especially at first was the wild bees. For miles back into the hills their nests lined the walls of the gorge. Millions of them made it their thoroughfare to and from the flower-covered plains below us. Particularly at morning and night their hum, echoing through the ravine and mingling with the murmur of the river, sounded like the drone of distant machinery.
"These bees were black and small; but they made up in fierceness for what they lacked in size. Their stings were far more painful and poisonous than those of our bees here. Some of us, myself included, learned this by experience; and we didn't need more than one lesson.
"By the middle of June the ends of the opposite beams were about fifty feet apart.
"One hot morning, between ten and eleven, I was reaming out a rivet-hole in the tip of the last beam. I was feeling out of sorts that forenoon. Lancy had given his orders to me gruff and short, though, as a matter of fact, he was probably just as gruff with everybody else. But when you're looking for trouble, you know, you don't have much trouble finding it.
"I straddled the beam, my feet almost touching under it. It was hot in the unclouded sun, and the air was full of tropical scents. Insects hummed round me. Bright-colored butterflies floated by. Now and then a flock of shrieking birds swept up the gorge. On the steel behind me a dozen men were busy.
"I had almost finished the hole, when my ears caught a humming, gradually growing louder. I looked down. Several yards below hung a black mass about as big as a nail-keg. It was a nest of wild bees swarming.
"At first I felt curious, interested. Then I noticed that the bunch was rising directly toward me, and I began to feel alarmed, as I remembered their fearful stings. If they attacked me I should be in a bad fix.
"Slowly, with a revolving motion and an intense, spitefulsszzzzz-ing, the irregular mass kept rising. Its center seemed so solid that I wondered how the wings had room to beat. Its outside frayed off into separate bees, drawn inward by a common attraction.
"It was not a yard under me now. I dared not move, for I knew what concentrated misery the swarm held for the man who angered it. As I watched it floating nearer, my skin crept and my; brain was fascinated by that monotonous buzzing. Perhaps, if I sat perfectly quiet, it would pass and leave me unharmed.
"For a moment, apparently undecided, the ball hovered under me.Then with a quickened motion, up it came, straight for my feet.
"I grew hot and cold. My flesh quivered with the imaginary stings of thousands of poisoned needles, as the fearful mass melted apart and settled in thick clusters on my shoes and legs!
"As I watched the crawling thousands come to rest, I simply choked with terror. What could I do? If I made the slightest motion to get up, they would swarm over me like lightning, and sting me to death.
"Twenty feet behind me one of my mates began to hammer, shaking the beam with his blows. I was afraid the jar might anger the bees into an attack.
"'Stop that pounding, Jim!' I begged huskily, as he ceased for a moment. The hammering stopped.
"Then exclamations of alarm and sympathy fell upon my ears, and presently all work on the steel was suspended. I could hear feet shuffling quietly back to the bank. Soon I was left alone on the truss, threatened with a death ten times more horrible than any tiger or snake could inflict.
"Not daring to move a muscle, not even to turn my head, I sat, as it seemed to me, for hours, perfectly rigid, staring straight forward at the red-painted end of the opposite beam, wavering in the heat fifty feet away. My brain was clear as glass, my senses keen. Low, excited voices babbled behind me. I could smell onions boiling in the cook's quarters, and hear his pans and dishes rattling.
"Every little while I turned my eyes downward, hoping to see the bees getting ready to leave. But my shoes and trousers were still buried inches deep under the sluggishly clinging black bodies.
"The brassy alarm-clock in the mess tent clanged out eleven. I had been sitting there only half an hour.
"The sun struck fiercely down on my head, scantily protected by my thin cap. A filmy white feather from some passing bird dropped before my face. I followed it past the hideous furry swelling on my feet, straight down through the breezeless air, till it dwindled to a white speck above the ledges two hundred feet below. That was where I should strike if I fell; but what torments I should suffer before I struck!
"The beam was hard and hot. I could not sit quiet forever. I stirred uneasily. An angry hum rose, and I stiffened. Some of the bees were above my knees. Suppose I should crush one between my leg and the steel! Suppose they should creep up and cover my body and head!
"A banging of pans began on the bank. Somebody had borrowed the cook's tinware in the hope of starting the swarm. A wave of unrest ran over the insects; but soon they settled into quiet again.
"The heat was affecting my head. I felt fretful, irritable. Why didn't somebody do something to help me? But what? My teeth chattered, a nervous chill shook me, and the bees buzzed at my shaking.
"The voices behind me stopped. Something was about to happen. I listened. Feet came stealing cautiously along the beam. What was going on?
"'Sit perfectly still.'
"It was Lancy's voice. What was he trying to do? I felt a consuming curiosity, but dared not turn my head. His voice came again:
"'Take a full breath; then shut your mouth.'
"What in the world had my mouth got to do with it? But I obeyed.
"A penetrating sulphurous scent stole through the thick air. Then right under my bee-swollen feet swung a small black kettle, suspended by a chain round its bail, and filled with a yellowish substance, burning bluely. It was brimstone, of which we had a supply for fastening bolts in the rocks. Lancy was trying to smoke the bees off.
"Back oscillated the kettle out of my sight. But the swarm had got the benefit of its contents and didn't like them. An ominous buzzing rose. Their wings lifted, then settled back. The scent was not strong enough to start them.
"I took another full breath. To me the strangling fumes had been sweet for the relief they promised. Once more the kettle swung under me, this time remaining a little longer. The smell was strong; with difficulty I repressed a coughing that threatened to shake me.
"This time the outer layer of bees rose slightly and hovered over the others. Some flew wildly and angrily about. A few dropped, stupefied. It would evidently take but little more to start the whole swarm. Lancy moved up close behind me.
"Again he swung the kettle under the bees. They had had enough. The entire mass left my legs. The greater number dropped down and hung a few feet below, but stray skirmishers flew confusedly about.
"So far, however, not a single bee had touched either of us. It looked as if we were to escape unharmed.
"Suddenly an unexpected disaster happened. One end of the bail pulled out, allowing the kettle to tilt down sidewise. Out fell the sulphur in a blue-burning, smoky stream. A moment later the chain slipped entirely off the bail; the kettle shot downward, leaving only a vanishing scent and a swarm of infuriated bees.
"Lancy grabbed my shoulder.
"'Quick! For your life!'
"I didn't need any urging; but I was stiff and slightly dizzy from the fumes, and it took me several seconds to get to my feet on the beam. Unfortunately, too, I crushed three or four bees that Were crawling stupidly on the steel.
"Then it seemed as if the whole swarm struck me at once. The sulphur may have half-stupefied them, but they hadn't forgotten how to sting.
"I'll never forget my walk along that narrow beam to the bank. The bees were all over me in a moment. My hands and face felt as if they were being punctured with red-hot splinters. Before I'd gone ten steps my eyes were closed so tight I couldn't see.
"I'd have gone off the beam head first if it hadn't been for Lancy. He had on gloves, and mosquito-netting over his head. But they crawled up his sleeves and down his neck, and stung him bad. Yet he didn't falter. With one hand stretched back and grasping mine, he walked cool and straight for the bank, as if he'd been on solid ground, instead of two hundred feet in the air.
"Blind and almost crazy from the stings, I stumbled along behind him. Every step was agony. I was almost tempted to jump from the beam and go down to be crushed to pulp on the boulders. The only thing that saved me was Lancy's hand, cool, firm and strong.
"'Steady! Steady!' he kept saying. I heard him through the shooting, burning pains, and it saved my reason. At last it didn't seem as if I could take another step.
"'Let go!' I cried, trying to get my hand loose; but he dragged me on.
"'In a minute,' said he; and all at once I felt the earth under my feet.
"I wasn't so far gone but I gave the hand I'd been holding a grip that squeezed the fingers together. It was all the thanks I could offer just then. Lancy squeezed back. Then everybody turned to and helped fight the bees off us.
"It was weeks before I got over those stings. Lancy had suffered, too, but of course not so badly. I don't know that he ever knew why I gripped his hand so hard. I was too much ashamed to tell him of the grudge I'd held. But I do know that after that I looked on him as one of my best friends. He'd saved my life, and a friend can't do much more for you than that."
By Sir John Lubbock
The subject of ants is a wide one, for there are at least a thousand species of ants, no two of which have the same habits. In this country (England) we have rather more than thirty, most of which I have kept in confinement. Their life is comparatively long: I have had working ants which were seven years old, and a queen ant lived in one of my nests for fifteen years. The community consists, in addition to the young, of males, which do no work, of wingless workers, and one or more queen mothers, who have at first wings, which, however, after one marriage flight, they throw off, as they never leave the nest again, and in it wings would of course be useless. The workers do not, except occasionally, lay eggs, but carry on all the affairs of the community. Some of them, and especially the younger ones, remain in the nest, excavate chambers and tunnels, and tend the young, which are sorted up according to age, so that my nests often had the appearance of a school, with the children arranged in classes. In our English ants the workers in each species are all similar except in size, but among foreign species there are some in which there are two or even more classes of workers, differing greatly not only in size, but also in form. The differences are not the result of age nor of race, but are adaptations to different functions, the nature of which, however, is not yet well understood. Among the Termites, those of one class certainly seem to act as soldiers, and among the true ants also some have comparatively immense heads and powerful jaws. It is doubtful, however, whether they form a real army. Bates observed that on a foraging expedition the large-headed individuals did not walk in the regular ranks, nor on the return did they carry any of the booty, but marched along at the side, and at tolerably regular intervals, "like subaltern officers in a marching regiment."
Solomon was, so far as we yet know, quite correct in describing ants as having "neither guide, overseer, nor ruler." The so-called queens are really mothers. Nevertheless it is true, and it is curious, that the working ants and bees always turn their heads towards the queen. It seems as if the sight of her gives them pleasure. On one occasion, while moving some ants from one nest into another for exhibition at the Royal Institution, I unfortunately crushed the queen and killed her. The others, however, did not desert her, or draw her out as they do dead workers, but on the contrary carried her into the new nest, and subsequently into a larger one with which I supplied them, congregating round her for weeks just as if she had been alive. One could hardly help fancying that they were mourning her loss, or hoping anxiously for her recovery.
The communities of ants are sometimes very large, numbering even up to 500,000 individuals; and it is a lesson to us, that no one has ever yet seen a quarrel between any two ants belonging to the same community. On the other hand, it must be admitted that they are in hostility, not only with most other insects, including ants of different species, but even with those of the same species if belonging to different communities. I have over and over again introduced ants from one of my nests into another nest of the same species, and they were invariably attacked, seized by a leg or an antenna, and dragged out.
It is evident therefore that the ants of each community all recognize one another, which is very remarkable. But more than this, I several times divided a nest into two halves, and found that even after a separation of a year and nine months they recognized one another, and were perfectly friendly; while they at once attacked ants from a different nest, although of the same species.
It has been suggested that the ants of each nest have some sign or password by which they recognize one another. To test this I made some insensible. First I tried chloroform, but this was fatal to them; and as therefore they were practically dead, I did not consider the test satisfactory. I decided therefore to intoxicate them. This was less easy than I had expected. None of my ants would voluntarily degrade themselves by getting drunk. However, I got over the difficulty by putting them into whisky for a few moments. I took fifty specimens, twenty-five from one nest and twenty-five from another, made them dead drunk, marked each with a spot of paint, and put them on a table close to where the other ants from one of the nests were feeding. The table was surrounded as usual with a moat of water to prevent them from straying. The ants which were feeding soon noticed those which I had made drunk. They seemed quite astonished to find their comrades in such disgraceful condition, and as much at a loss to know what to do with their drunkards as we are. After a while, however, to cut my story short, they carried them all away: the strangers they took to edge of the moat and dropped into the water, while they bore their friends home into the nest, where by degrees they slept off the effects of the spirit. Thus it is evident that they know their friends even when incapable of giving any sign or password.
This little experiment also shows that they help comrades in distress. If a wolf or a rook be ill or injured, we are told that it is driven away or even killed by its comrades. Not so with ants. For instance, in one of my nests an unfortunate ant, in emerging from the chrysalis skin, injured her legs so much that she lay on her back quite helpless. For three months, however, she was carefully fed and tended by the other ants. In another case an ant in the same manner had injured her antennae. I watched her also carefully to see what would happen. For some days she did not leave the nest. At last one day she ventured outside, and after a while met a stranger ant of the same species, but belonging to another nest, by whom she was at once attacked. I tried to separate them, but whether by her enemy, or perhaps by my well-meant but clumsy kindness, she was evidently much hurt and lay helplessly on her side. Several others passed her without taking any notice, but soon one came up, examined her carefully with her antennae, and carried her off tenderly to the nest. No one, I think, who saw it could have denied to that ant one attribute of humanity, the quality of kindness.
The existence of such communities as those of ants or bees implies, no doubt, some power of communication, but the amount is still a matter of doubt. It is well known that if one bee or ant discovers a store of food, others soon find their way to it. This, however, does not prove much. It makes all the difference whether they are brought or sent. If they merely accompany on her return a companion who has brought a store of food, it does not imply much. To test this, therefore, I made several experiments. For instance, one cold day my ants were almost all in their nests. One only was out hunting and about six feet from home. I took a dead bluebottle fly, pinned it on to a piece of cork, and put it down just in front of her. She at once tried to carry off the fly, but to her surprise found it immovable. She tugged and tugged, first one way and then another for about twenty minutes, and then went straight off to the nest. During that time not a single ant had come out; in fact she was the only ant of that nest out at the time. She went straight in, but in a few seconds—less than half a minute—came out again with no less than twelve friends, who trooped off with her, and eventually tore up the dead fly, carrying it off in triumph.
Now the first ant took nothing home with her; she must therefore somehow have made her friends understand that she had found some food, and wanted them to come and help her to secure it. In all such cases, however, so far as my experience goes, the ants brought their friends, and some of my experiments indicated that they are unable to send them.
Certain species of ants, again, make slaves of others, as Huber first observed. If a colony of the slave-making ants is changing the nest, a matter which is left to the discretion of the slaves, the latter carry their mistresses to their new home. Again, if I uncovered one of my nests of the Fuscous ant (Formica fusca), they all began running about in search of some place of refuge. If now I covered over one small part of the nest, after a while some ant discovered it. In such a case, however, the brave little insect never remained there, she came out in search of her friends, and the first one she met she took up in her jaws, threw over her shoulder (their way of carrying friends), and took into the covered part; then both came out again, found two more friends and brought them in, the same manoeuvre being repeated until the whole community was in a place of safety. This I think says much for their public spirit, but it seems to prove that, in F. fusca at least, the powers of communication are but limited.
One kind of slave-making ant has become so completely dependent on their slaves that even if provided with food they will die of hunger, unless there is a slave to put it into their mouths, I found, however, that they would thrive very well if supplied with a slave for an hour or so once a week to clean and feed them.
But in many cases the community does not consist of ants only. They have domestic animals, and indeed it is not going too far to say that they have domesticated more animals than we have. Of these the most important are Aphides on trees and bushes; others collect root-feeding Aphides into their nests. They serve as cows to the ants, which feed on the honey-dew secreted by the Aphides. Not only, moreover, do the ants protect the Aphides themselves, but collect their eggs in autumn, and tend them carefully through the winter, ready for the next spring. Many other insects are also domesticated by ants, and some of them, from living constantly underground, have completely lost their eyes and become quite blind.
When we see a community of ants working together in perfect harmony, it is impossible not to ask ourselves how far they are mere exquisite automatons; how far they are conscious beings. When we watch an ant-hill tenanted by thousands of industrious inhabitants, excavating chambers, forming tunnels, making roads, guarding their home, gathering food, feeding the young, tending their domestic animals—each one fulfilling its duties industriously, and without confusion—it is difficult; altogether to deny to them the gift of reason; and all our recent observations tend to confirm the opinion that their mental powers differ from those of men, not so much in kind as in degree.
By Harriet Beecher Stowe
Miss Katy-did sat on the branch of a flowering azalea, in her best suit of fine green and silver, with wings of point-lace from Mother Nature's finest web.
Miss Katy was in the very highest possible spirits, because her gallant cousin, Colonel Katy-did, had looked in to make her a morning visit. It was a fine morning, too, which goes for as much among the Katy-dids as among men and women. It was, in fact, a morning that Miss Katy thought must have been made on purpose for her to enjoy herself in. There had been a patter of rain the night before, which had kept the leaves awake talking to each other till nearly morning, but by dawn the small winds had blown brisk little puffs, and whisked the heavens clear and bright with their tiny wings, as you have seen Susan clear away the cobwebs in your mamma's parlor; and so now there were only left a thousand blinking, burning water drops, hanging like convex mirrors at the end of each leaf, and Miss Katy admired herself in each one.
"Certainly I am a pretty creature," she said to herself; and when the gallant Colonel said something about being dazzled by her beauty, she only tossed her head and took it as quite a matter of course.
"The fact is, my dear Colonel," she said, "I am thinking of giving a party, and you must help me make out the lists."
"My dear, you make me the happiest of Katy-dids."
"Now," said Miss Katy-did, drawing an azalea-leaf towards her, "let us see,—whom shall we have? The Fireflies, of course; everybody wants them, they are so brilliant; a little unsteady, to be sure, but quite in the higher circles."
"Yes, we must have the Fireflies," echoed the Colonel.
"Well, then,—and the Butterflies and the Moths. Now, there's a trouble. There's such an everlasting tribe of those Moths; and if you invite dull people they're always sure all to come, every one of them. Still, if you have the Butterflies, you can't leave out the Moths."
"Old Mrs. Moth has been laid up lately with a gastric fever, and that may keep two or three of the Misses Moth at home," said the Colonel.
"What ever could give the old lady such a turn?" said Miss Katy. "I thought she never was sick."
"I suspect it's high living. I understand she and her family ate up a whole ermine cape last month, and it disagreed with them."
"For my part, I can't conceive how the Moths can live as they do", said Miss Katy with a face of disgust. "Why, I could no more eat worsted and fur, as they do—"
"That is quite evident from the fairy-like delicacy of your appearance," said the Colonel. "One can see that nothing so gross and material has ever entered into your system."
"I'm sure," said Miss Katy, "mamma says she don't know what does keep me alive; half a dew-drop and a little hit of the nicest part of a rose-leaf, I assure you, often last me for a day. But we are forgetting our list. Let's see,—the Fireflies, Butterflies, Moths. The Bees must come, I suppose."
"The Bees are a worthy family," said the Colonel.
"Worthy enough, but dreadfully hum-drum" said Miss Katy. "They never talk about anything but honey and housekeeping; still they are a class of people one cannot neglect."
"Well, then, there are the Bumble-bees."
"Oh, I doat on them! General Bumble is one of the most dashing, brilliant fellows of the day.
"I think he is shockingly corpulent," said Colonel Katy-did, not at all pleased to hear him praised, "don't you?"
"I don't know but heisa little stout," said Miss Katy; "but so distinguished and elegant in his manners,—something martial and breezy about him."
"Well, if you invite the Bumble-bees you must have the Hornets."
"Those spiteful Hornets,—I detest them!"
"Nevertheless, dear Miss Katy, one does not like to offend theHornets."
"No, one can't. There are those five Misses Hornet,—dreadful old maids! as full of spite as they can live. You may be sure they will every one come, and be looking about to make spiteful remarks. Put down the Hornets, though."
"How about the Mosquitoes?" said the Colonel.
"Those horrid Mosquitoes,—they are dreadfully common! Can't one cut them?"
"Well, dear Miss Katy," said the Colonel, "if you ask my candid opinion as a friend, I should saynot. there's young Mosquito, who graduated last year, has gone into literature, and is connected with some of our leading papers, and they say he carries the sharpest pen of all the writers. It won't do to offend him."
"And so I suppose we must have his old aunts, and all six of his sisters, and all his dreadfully common relations."
"It is a pity," said the Colonel, "but one must pay one's tax to society."
Just at this moment the conference was interrupted by a visitor, Miss Keziah Cricket, who came in with her work-bag on her arm to ask a subscription for a poor family of Ants who had just had their house hoed up in clearing the garden-walks.
"How stupid of them," said Katy, "not to know better than to put their house in the garden-walk; that's just like those Ants!"
"Well, they are in great trouble; all their stores destroyed, and their father killed,—cut in two by a hoe."
"How very shocking! I don't like to hear of such disagreeable things,—it affects my nerves terribly. Well, I'm sure I haven't anything to give. Mamma said yesterday she was sure she didn't know how our bills were to be paid,—and there's my green satin with point-lace yet to come home." And Miss Katy-did shrugged her shoulders and affected to be very busy with Colonel Katy-did, in just the way that young ladies sometimes do when they wish to signify to visitors that they had better leave.
Little Miss Cricket perceived how the case stood, and so hopped briskly off, without giving herself even time to be offended. "Poor extravagant little thing!" said she to herself, "it was hardly worth while to ask her."
"Pray, shall you invite the Crickets?" said Colonel Katy-did.
"Who? I? Why, Colonel, what a question! Invite the Crickets? Of what can you be thinking?"
"And shall you not ask the Locusts, or the Grasshoppers?"
"Certainly. The Locusts, of course,—a very old and distinguished family; and the Grasshoppers are pretty well, and ought to be asked. But we must draw the line somewhere,—and the Crickets! Why it's shocking even to think of!"
"I thought they were nice, respectable people."
"O, perfectly nice and respectable,—very good people, in fact, so far as that goes. But then you must see the difficulty."
"My dear cousin, I am afraid you must explain."
"Why, theircolor, to be sure. Don't you see?"
"Oh!" said the Colonel. "That's it, is it? Excuse me, but I have been living in France, where these distinctions are wholly unknown, and I have not yet got myself in the train of fashionable ideas here."
"Well, then, let me teach you," said Miss Katy. "You know we go for no distinctions except those created by Nature herself, and we found our rank upon color, because that is clearly a thing that none has any hand in but our Maker. You see?"
"Yes; but who decides what color shall be the reigning color?"
"I'm surprised to hear the question! The only true color—the only proper one—isourcolor, to be sure. A lovely pea-green is the precise shade on which to found aristocratic distinction. But then we are liberal;—we associate with the Moths, who are gray; with the Butterflies, who are blue-and-gold colored; with the Grasshoppers, yellow and brown;—and society would become dreadfully mixed if it were not fortunately ordered that the Crickets are black as jet. The fact is, that a class to be looked down upon is necessary to all elegant society, and if the Crickets were not black, we could not keep them down, because, as everybody knows, they are often a great deal cleverer than we are. They have a vast talent for music and dancing; they are very quick at learning, and would be getting to the very top of the ladder if we once allowed them to climb. But being black is a convenience, —because, as long as we are green and they are black, we have a superiority that can never be taken from us. Don't you see now?"
"Oh, yes, I see exactly," said the Colonel.
"Now that Keziah Cricket, who just came in here, is quite a musician, and her old father plays the violin beautifully; by the way, we might engage him for our orchestra."
And so Miss Katy's ball came off, and the performers kept it up from sundown till daybreak, so that it seemed as if every leaf in the forest were alive. The Katy-dids, and the Mosquitoes, and the Locusts, and a full orchestra of Crickets made the air perfectly vibrate, insomuch that old Parson Too-whit, who was preaching a Thursday evening lecture to a very small audience, announced to his hearers that he should certainly write a discourse against dancing, for the next weekly occasion.
The good Doctor was as good as his word in the matter, and gave out some very sonorous discourses, without in the least stopping the round of gayeties kept up by these dissipated Katy-dids, which ran on, night after night, till the celebrated Jack Frost epidemic, which occurred somewhere about the first of September.
Poor Miss Katy, with her flimsy green satin and point-lace, was one of the first victims, and fell from the bough in company with a sad shower of last year's leaves. The worthy Cricket family, however, avoided Jack Frost by emigrating in time to the chimney-corner of a nice little cottage that had been built in the wood that summer.
There good old Mr. and Mrs. Cricket, with sprightly Miss Keziah and her brothers and sisters, found a warm and welcome home; and when the storm howled without, and lashed the poor naked trees, the Cricket on the warm hearth would chirp out cheery welcome to papa as he came in from the snowy path, or mamma as she sat at her work-basket.
"Cheep, cheep, cheep!" little Freddy would say. "Mamma, who is it says 'cheep'?"
"Dear Freddy, it is our own dear little cricket, who loves us and comes to sing to us when the snow is on the ground."
So when poor Miss Katy-did's satin and lace were all swept away, the warm home-talents of the Crickets made for them a welcome refuge.
By Carl Ewald
It all happened long, long ago. There were no towns then with houses and streets, and church steeples domineering over everything.
There were no schools, for there were not many boys, and those that there were learnt from their father to shoot with the bow and arrow, to hunt the stag in his covert, to kill the bear in order to make clothes out of his skin, and to rub two pieces of wood together till they caught fire. When they knew this perfectly, they had finished their education.
There were no railways either, and no cultivated fields, no ships on the sea, no books, for there was nobody who could read them.
There was scarcely anything except Trees. But Trees there were in plenty. They stood everywhere from coast to coast; they saw themselves reflected in all the rivers and lakes, and stretched their mighty boughs up towards heaven. They leaned out over the shore, dipped their boughs in the black fen water, and from the high hills looked out proudly over the land.
They all knew each other, for they belonged to a great family, and were proud of it.
"We are allOakTrees," they said. "We own the land, and rule over it."
And they were right. There were only a few human beings there in those days, and those that there were were nothing better than wild animals. The Bear, the Wolf, and the Fox went out hunting, while the Stag grazed by the edge of the fen. The Field Mouse sat outside his hole and ate acorns, and the Beaver built his artistic houses by the river banks.
One day the Bear came trudging along and lay down at full breadth under a great Oak Tree, "Are you there again, you robber?" said the Oak, and shook a lot of withered leaves down over him.
"You should not squander your leaves, my old friend," said the Bear, licking his paws. "That is all the shade you can give against the sun."
"If you are not pleased with me, you can go," answered the Oak proudly. "I am lord in the land, and whatever way you look you find my brothers and nothing else."
"True," muttered the Bear. "That is just what is so sickening. I have been for a little tour abroad, I may tell you, and am just a little bit spoilt. It was in a land down towards the south—there I took a nap under the Beech Trees. They are tall, slim Trees, not crooked old things like you. And their tops are so dense that the sunbeams cannot creep through them. It was a real pleasure there to take a midday nap, I assure you."
"Beech Trees?" said the Oak inquisitively. "What are they?"
"You might well wish you were half as pretty as a Beech Tree," said the Bear. "But I don't want to chatter any more with you just now. I have had to trot a mile on account of a confounded hunter who struck me on one of my hind legs with an arrow. Now I should like to have a sleep, and perhaps you will be kind enough to leave me at peace, since you cannot give me shade." The Bear stretched himself out and closed his eyes; but he got no sleepthattime, for the other Trees had heard his story, and they began chattering and talking and rustling their leaves in a way never known in the wood before.
"What on earth can those Trees be?" said one of them.
"It is, of course, a mere story; the Bear wishes to impose upon us," said the other.
"What kind of Trees can they be whose leaves sit so close together that the sunbeams cannot creep between them?" asked a Little Oak, who was listening to what the big ones were talking about.
But by his side stood an old gnarled Tree, who gave the Little Oak a clout on the head with one of his lowest boughs. "Hold your tongue," he said, "and don't talk till you have something to talk about. You need none of you believe a word of the Bear's nonsense. I am much taller than you, and I can see far out over the wood. But so far as ever I can see, there is nothing but Oak Trees."
The Little Oak was shamefaced, and held his tongue; and the other big Trees spoke to one another in low whispers, for they had great respect for the old one.
But the Bear got up and rubbed his eyes. "Now you have disturbed my midday nap," he growled angrily, "and I declare that I will have my revenge. When I come back I will bring some Beech nuts with me, and I vow you will all turn yellow with jealousy when you see how pretty the new Trees are."
Then he made off. But the Oaks talked the whole day long one to another about the funny Trees he had told them about. "If they come, I will kill them," said the Little Oak Tree, but directly afterwards he got one on the head from the Old Oak.
"If they come, you shall treat them politely, you young dog," said he. "But they will not come."
But in this the Old Oak was wrong, for they did come.
Towards autumn the Bear came back and lay; down under the Old Oak. "My friends down there wish me to present their compliments," he said, and he picked some funny things out of his shaggy coat. "Here you may see what I have for you."
"What is it?" asked the Oak.
"That isBeech" answered the Bear—"the Beech nuts which I promised you." Then he trampled them into the ground and prepared to go back.
"It is a pity I cannot stay and see how angry you will be," he growled, "but those confounded human beings have begun to press one so hard. The day before yesterday they killed my wife and one of my brothers, and I must see about finding a place where I can live in peace. There is scarcely a spot left where a self-respecting Bear can stay. Goodbye, you old, gnarled Oak Trees!"
When the Bear had shambled off, the Trees looked at one another anxiously.
"Let us see what comes of it," said the Old Oak.
And after this they composed themselves to rest. The winter came and tore all their leaves off them, the snow lay high over the whole land, and every Tree stood deep in his own thoughts and dreamt of the spring.
And when the spring came the grass stood green, and the birds began singing where they left off last. The flowers came up in multitudes from the earth, and everything looked fresh and gay. The Oak Trees alone stood with leafless boughs.
"It is the most dignified thing to come last!" they said to one another. "The kings of the wood do not come till the whole company is assembled."
But at last they came. All the leaves burst forth from the swollen buds, and the Trees looked at one another and complimented one another on their beauty. The Little Oak had grown ever so much. He was very proud of it, and he thought that he had now the right to join in the conversation. "Nothing has come yet of the Bear's Beech Trees," he said jeeringly, at the same time glancing anxiously up at the Old Oak, who used to give him one on the head.
The Old Oak heard what he said very plainly, and the other Trees also; but they said nothing. Not one of them had forgotten what the Bear had told them, and every morning when the sun came out they peeped down to look for the Beeches. They were really a little uneasy, but they were too proud to talk about it.
And one day the little shoots did at last burst forth from the earth. The sun shone on them, and the rain fell on them, so it was not long before they grew tall.
"Oh, how pretty they are!" said the Great Oak, and stooped his crooked boughs still more, so that they could get a good view of them. "You are welcome among us," said the Old Oak, and graciously inclined his head to them. "You shall be my foster—children, and be treated just as well as my own."
"Thanks," said the Little Beeches, and they said no more.
But the Little Oak could not bear the strange Trees. "It is dreadful the way you shoot up into the air," he said in vexation. "You are already half as tall as I am. But I beg you to take notice that I am much older, and of good family besides."
The Beeches laughed with their little, tiny green leaves, but said nothing.
"Shall I bend my branches a little aside so that the sun can shine better on you?" the Old Tree asked politely.
"Many thanks," answered the Beeches. "We can grow very nicely in the shade."
And the whole summer passed by, and another summer after that, and still more summers. The Beeches went on growing, and at last quite overtopped the Little Oak.
"Keep your leaves to yourself," cried the Oak; "you overshadow me, and that is what I can't endure. I must have plenty of sunshine. Take your leaves away or I perish."
The Beeches only laughed and went on growing. At last they closed together over the Little Oak's head, and then he died. "That was a horrid thing to do," a great Oak called out, and shook his boughs in terror.
But the Old Oak took his foster-children under his protection. "It serves him right," he said. "He is paid out for his boasting. I say it, though he is my own flesh and blood. But now you must behave yourselves, Little Beeches, or I will give you a clout on the head."
Years went by, and the Beeches went on growing, and they grew till they were tall young Trees, which reached up among the branches of the Old Oak.
"You begin to be rather pushing," the Old Tree said. "You should try to grow a little broader, and stop this shooting up into the air. Just see where your branches are soaring. Bend them properly, as you see us do. How will you be able to hold out when a regular storm comes? I assure you the Wind gives one's head a good shaking. My old boughs have creaked many a time; and what do you think will become of the flimsy finery that you stick up in the air?"
"Every one has his own manner of growth, and we have ours," answered the young Beeches. "This is the way it's done where we come from, and we are perhaps as good as you are."
"That is not a polite way of speaking to an old Tree with moss on his boughs," said the Oak. "I begin to repent that I was so kind to you. If you have a spark of honourable feeling alive in you, be good enough to move your leaves a little to one side. There have been scarcely any buds on my lowest branches this year, you overshadow me so."
"I don't quite understand how that concerns us," answered the Beeches. "Every one has quite enough to do to look after himself. If he is equal to his work, and has luck, it turns out well for him; if not, he must be prepared to go to the wall. That is the way of the world."
Then the Oak's lowest branch died, and he began to be seriously alarmed. "You are pretty things," he said, "if this is the way you reward me for my hospitality. When you were little I let you grow at my feet, and sheltered you against the storm, I let the sun shine on you as much as ever he would, and I treated you as if you were my own children. And in return for all this you stifle me."
"Stuff and nonsense!" said the Beeches. So they put forth flowers and fruit, and when the fruit was ripe the Wind shook the boughs and scattered it round far and wide.
"You are quick people like me," said the Wind. "I like you for it, and am glad to do you a good turn." And the Fox rolled on the ground at the foot of the Beech Trees and got his fur full of the prickly fruits, and ran with them far out into the country. The Bear did the same, and grinned into the bargain at the Old Oak while he lay and rested in the shadow of the Beeches. The Field Mouse was beside himself with joy over his new food, and thought that Beech nuts tasted much nicer than acorns. All round new little Beech Trees shot up, which grew just as fast as their parents, and looked as green and as happy as if they did not know what an uneasy conscience was.
But the Old Oak gazed sadly out over the wood. The light-green Beech leaves were peeping out everywhere, and the Oaks were sighing and bewailing their distress to one another. "They are taking our strength out of us," they said, and shook as much as the Beeches around would let them. "The land is ours no longer." One bough died after another, and the Storm broke them off and cast them on the ground. The Old Oak had now only a few leaves left at the very top. "The end is near," he said gravely.
By this time there were many more human beings in the land than there were before, and they made haste to hew down the Oaks while there were still some remaining.
"Oak timber is better than Beech timber," they said.
"At last we get a little appreciation," said the old Oak, "but we have to pay for it with our lives."
Then he said to the Beech Trees,—"What was I thinking of when I helped you on in your young days? What an old stupid I was! Before that, we Oak Trees were lords in the land; and now every year I see my brothers around me perishing in the fight against you. It will soon be all over with me, and not one of my acorns has sprouted under your shade. But before I die I should like to know the name you give to such conduct."
"That will not take long to say, old friend," answered the Beeches. "We call itcompetition,and that is not any discovery of our own. It is competition which rules the world."
"I do not know these foreign words of yours," said the Oak. "I call it mean ingratitude." And then he died.
By Mrs. Alfred Gatty
The trunk of the Oak Tree in the corner of the timber yard lay groaning under the plank, which a party of children had thrown across him to play see-saw upon.
Not that the plank was so heavy, even with two or three little ones sitting on each end, nor that the Oak was too weak to hold it up—though, of course, the pressure was pretty strong just at the centre, where the plank balanced. But it was such a use to be put to!
The other half of the Tree had been cut into beautiful even planks, some time before, but this was the root end, and his time had not yet come, and he was getting impatient.
"Here we go up, up, up!" cried the children, as the plank rose into the sky on one side. "I shall catch the tree-tops—no! the church steeple—no! the stars."
Or, "Here we go down, down, down!" cried the others. "Safe and snug on the ground—no! right through the world—no! out at the other side. Ah! steady there, stupid old stump!" This was because the plank had swerved, not the Tree.
And so the game went on; for the ups and downs came in turns, and the children shrieked with delight, and the poor Tree groaned loudly all the time.
"And I am to sit here; and bear not only their weight but their blame, and be called stupid and be told to keep steady, when it is they who are giddy and can't be depended upon; and to be contented, while they do nothing but play pranks and enjoy themselves," said he; but he said it to himself, for he did not know which to complain to—the children or the plank. As he groaned, however, he thought of the time when he was king of the little wood, where he had grown up from the acorn days of his babyhood, and it broke his heart to be so insignificant now.
[Illustration: THEY LEARNT FROM THEIR FATHER TO HUNT THE STAG IN HIS COVERTFrom the painting by John Hassall]
"Why have they not cut me into planks like the rest?" continued he, angrily. "I might have led the see-saw myself then, as this fellow does, who leans so heavily on my back, without a thought that I am as good or better than himself. Why have they not given me the chance of enjoying myself like these others—up in the sky at one end, down on the ground at the other, full of energy and life? The whole timber yard, but myself, has a chance. Position and honour, as well as pleasure, are for everybody except me. But I am to stick in a corner merely for others to steady themselves upon—unthought of or despised, made a tool of—Miserable me!"
Now this groaning was so dreadful, it woke the large Garden Snail in the grass hard by, whose custom it was to come out from his haunt under the timber-yard wall every morning at sunrise, and crawl round and round the Oak trunk to see the world come to life, leaving a slimy track behind him on the bark wherever he moved. It was his constitutional stroll, and he had continued it all the season, pursuing his morning reflections without interruption, and taking his nap in the grass afterwards, as regularly as the day came round.
But napping through such lamentation was impossible, and accordingly he once more began to crawl up the side of the Oak trunk, his head turning now to one side, now to the other, his horns extended to the utmost, that, if possible, he might see what was the matter.
But he could not make out, though he kept all his eyes open: so by-and-by he made the inquiry of his old friend the Tree.
"What is the matter, do you ask?" groaned the Oak more heavily than ever—"you who can change your position and act independently when you wish; you who arenotleft a useless log as I am, the scorn and sport of my own kith and kin? Yes, the very planks who balance themselves on my body, and mock me by their activity, have probably come from my own side, and once hung on me as branches, drinking in life from the life I gave. Oh miserable me! miserable, despised, useless!"
Now there may be plenty of animals to be found with more brilliant abilities and livelier imagination than the Snail, but for gravity of demeanour and calmness of nerve who is his equal? And if a sound judgment be not behind such outward signs, there is no faith to be put in faces!
Accordingly, Sir Helix Hortensis—so let us call him, for that is his scientific name—made no answer at first to the wailings of the Oak. Three times he crawled round it, leaving three fresh traces of his transit, before he spoke, his horns turning hither and thither as those wonderful eyes at the end strove to take in the full state of the case. And his are not the eyes, you know, which waste their energies in scatter-brained staring. He keeps them cool in their cases till there is something to be looked at, and then turns them inside out to do their work.
And thus he looked, and he looked, and he looked, while the children went on shouting, and the plank went on see-sawing, and the Tree went on groaning; and as he looked, he considered.
"Have you anything to say?" at last inquired the Oak, who had had long experience of Sir Helix's wisdom.