Part 3

"I must be busy," said the Queen, "or there will be no young bees for next season."

Up and down the hive passages she went, placing a little egg in each bedroom, and leaving it there to be hatched by the warmth of the hive. Up and down she went till thousands of eggs were laid.

All were busy and happy in the hive and everything went well. Then one sad day word went round that the Queen was missing. In a moment everybody left their work and rushed wildly through the hive, looking for her in every room and buzzing out their fear and sorrow. She was not in the hive!

Her guards were questioned. They reported that she had gone for a short flight in the fresh air, saying that she did not need their attendance. Scouts were sent out in all directions to look for her, while the bees stood about in groups, too anxious to do anything but wait for news.

One by one the scouts returned, reporting no success in their search. Others were sent out, and still others, but they too returned with no news. Then the buzzing died down to a sorrowful silence, for the bee-people felt that their Queen was lost. "She must have met with her death out there," they whispered.

Suddenly a joyful call came from a returning scout; next moment the Queen came flying in, tired and ruffled and shaking with fear. How her people crowded about her in their joy! They caressed her, stroked her trembling wings, and begged her to tell them what had happened.

"I flew rather far from the hive," she said, "and a huge monster called a boy threw his cap over me and then picked me up in his hand. I would not sting him as you might have done, so I was helpless. He carried me round the garden to another boy-monster, and they agreed to pull off my wings. Think of my terror! I struggled hard to escape, and at last managed to slip through the clumsy fingers of the monster, and flew home. Oh dear, it was terrible! I shall never again go out by myself."

"No, you must not," said her people. "We could not bear to lose our dear Queen."

They comforted her, and fed her, and soon the hive was going on again in its old, happy way.

BILLYBUZZ THE DRONE

"You are lazy," said the boy who watched the bees. "Why don't you work like the others?"

Billybuzz the Drone helped himself to a little more honey from the best pantry; then he turned his big brown head slowly towards the boy who watched the bees.

"You people will never take the trouble to understand us," he said. "You call us lazy, but we cannot work. We are not made like the workers."

"How is that?" asked the boy. "Surely you can fly about and gather honey? That is easy enough."

"Not if one's tongue is too short," replied the Drone. "The Worker Bees have long, hairy tongues to lick the honey out of the deep flower-cups, but my tongue is too short, and would not reach far enough down."

"But you could gather pollen to make bee-bread for the baby bees," said the boy.

"I have no pollen-basket," said the Drone.

"Can you not make wax?"

"No. I have no wax pockets in my coat."

"Then you could be a soldier-bee, and help to guard the Queen and hive."

"I should be useless. I have no sting."

"Oh, well, at any rate you could be a nurse and give the babies their meals, like those nurses over there."

"Why should I? Why should I work at all when I am the King?"

The boy stared. "You a King!" he cried

"Yes. Did you not know that we have a King and Queen?" asked the Drone.

"I knew that you have a Queen; we often hear about her. But I didn't think about a King."

"Well, I am the King--at least, I intend to be soon. At present I am a Prince. When my Queen comes out we shall be married, and then I shall be King. There are other drones waiting, but they shall not have her. Listen--she is singing in her golden room now. That means that she is coming out soon. I must be ready for the beautiful Queen."

He walked out of the hive into the sunshine. Here he brushed himself and spread his shining wings and looked very big and handsome. There was a stir in the hive, and the young Queen flew out and mounted into the air. With a rush Billybuzz flew swiftly after her, followed by the other drones who had been waiting. Whoever could catch the Queen first was to marry her, so they all did their best. Higher and higher they flew, till they were all out of sight.

The boy waited below, and presently the disappointed drones came back, bringing the news that Billybuzz had won the race. So Billybuzz the Drone married the Queen, and became King.

A few days later the boy again came to watch the bees.

"Where is Billybuzz the King?" he asked a drone who sat at the front door in the sunshine.

"Dead!" said the drone.

"Dear me!" said the boy. "How did that happen?"

"Oh, he just died," said the drone. "We all die very soon after we become kings. We are not made to live as long as the workers or the queens."

"Is that so? Then I would rather be born a worker than a king," said the boy.

"Everyone to his taste," said the drone. "A short life and a merry one for me."

HONEY

A little golden flower-cup, A little golden bee. A little store of honey made For Nell, and Jack, and me.

A little crystal honey-jar, A little pantry shelf. A naughty little Nelly-girl Falls down, and hurts herself.

ON THE HILLSIDE

The sun shone gaily, the skylark sang her morning song, and the crickets chirped their merriest; but the things that usually lived so peacefully on the hillside were quarrelling.

It was the wind who began it. As he lifted the pollen from one patch of grass-flowers and carried it to the next he cried boastingly: "What a friend I am to you tiny creatures! If it were not for me you could bear no seed. I am indeed useful. I am sure nobody does so much good."

"How absurd!" cried the bees. "Anyone would think you did all the work of the world. You certainly carry the grass pollen, but think of the flowers whose pollen we carry. What would the clover here do without us? And the wild flowers, and the flowers in the gardens and orchards all over the world. We are certainly the most useful."

At this thousands of earth-worms popped their heads above the ground. "If you are talking about usefulness, don't forget us," they said. "You see very little of us, for we come out at night when most of you are asleep. But think of all the work we do. We burrow and burrow here in our millions, ploughing the ground day after day till every inch is opened up to let in the sweet air and drain away the water from the surface. How could the flowers and grasses live if we did not do this? Think how fine we keep the soil, powdering it as we do in our burrowings! And how rich we make it by dragging down decaying leaves into our holes every night. The world would be a sorry place for everything that grows and lives if we did not work so hard. We are surely more useful than anybody."

The grasses waved their flowered heads. "All that is true enough," they said; "but nobody can possibly be more useful than we are. Think how we clothe the land and give food to hundreds of animals and shelter to millions of insects."

A little cloud sailed softly down on to the hill-top to listen. "What could any of you do without the clouds?" she asked. "You all depend on our rain for your lives; you must confess you are less useful than we are."

"Ho! ho! ho!" laughed the merry sun. "Fancy quarrelling this fine morning! Now I will tell you, and this will settle it once for all. You are all useful, and not one of you could be spared, and not one of you could do well without the other. Everything helps everything else. The worms help the grass, and the grass feeds the worms; the bees help the flowers, and the flowers feed the bees; the wind helps the clouds, and the clouds become rain and help the wind in its work. And I am here over you all, and if it were not for me nothing could live, so, after all, I am the most useful. If I did not shine there would be no grass, no worms, no flowers, no bees, no wind, and no clouds. Now go on with your work."

THE SUN'S NEST

Winnie and I went sailing fast Out to the golden West. We wished to see the Sun drop down Into his shining nest.

Our ship was soft and pearly white-- A dear little cloud up high. We sailed along at sunset time, Across the flaming sky.

Winnie stood up and laughed with joy; Her curls blew round her head. The golden clouds raced past our ship, To see the Sun to bed.

The nest was made of red, red cloud, Hung like a rosy swing: An angel stood on either side-- We heard them softly sing.

The tired Sun came dropping down, And cuddled in his nest. The angels spread their snow-white wings To guard him through his rest.

The soft wee clouds went home with us, The sky grew grey and blue; The stars peeped out and laughed and winked, And said: "Good-night, you two!"

CRIKITTY-CRIK

Mrs. Cricket flew busily round, looking for a good place for her eggs. "This will do," she said at last. "Here is plenty of food for them when they hatch." She flew down close to the roots of a soft green plant, pierced a hole in the ground with her piercer, placed the eggs in it with her egg placer, and flew off.

"Just the very dinner I like best," said Mr. Beetle to himself; he ran to the hole, dug out the eggs, and ate them up.

He thought he had them all, so he went away; but there was one left, hidden under a grain of earth. After a while it hatched out into Crikitty-Crik.

Crikitty-Crik could not fly, or sing, or lay eggs, for he was only a tiny cricket-baby. All he could do was eat, but that he did thoroughly. He gobbled up every scrap of soft vegetable food he could find in the earth, and as his mother had chosen a good place for him he found plenty and soon grew fat. His front legs were specially made for burrowing, and his jaws were made for nibbling.

One day he stopped eating and said: "I should like to fly." So he let his skin grow hard, and he shut himself up in it, and made his wings. He altered the shape of his mouth, too. "For I am going to suck leaves when I am a grown-up cricket," he said.

When everything was ready he pushed himself out through the top of his old skin and left it lying on the ground. Then up he flew to suck the juices of the leaves.

Such a handsome fellow he was--all green and gold and fine lace-work. And he could make music, for under his body he had grown two little flat sounding boards. When he moved his hind-legs quickly over these they made the cricket-song: "Crikitty-Crik! Crikitty-Crik! What a fine world it is!"

THE DISCONTENTED ROOT

The Root was grumbling again, and everybody felt unhappy. "It's not fair," she said. "Why should I have to stay down here in the dark while you can all live in the sunshine? It is work, work, work all day down here, finding water and food for you all; while you do nothing but enjoy yourselves."

"Oh, you must not say that," cried the stems. "We are as busy as you are. Your work would be useless if we did not spend our time carrying water and food from you to the leaves and flowers. And think of the weight we are bearing. You cannot say your work is harder than ours."

"It certainly is not harder than ours," said the leaves. "Think of all that goes on in our workshops. We supply as much food from the air as you from the earth. You must not say we are not busy."

The flowers bent their heads and spoke. "Dear little Root-sister," they said, "do not make us unhappy with your discontent. Life is very full of work for all of us. You must give us food or we cannot live, and we flowers must make our seed or the family would die out, so we help each other. Your work lies in the dark earth, certainly, while ours is in the sunshine; but the life up here would not suit you. I am sure you would die if you tried to live above the ground."

But the Root would not understand. "Fine words," she said, "but no comfort to me! Oh! I wish I could go up into the sunshine."

One day she had her wish, for a slip of the gardener's spade turned her above the ground. She was delighted, but the others were in despair. "Oh, dear, whatever will become of us now?" they cried. "If only the gardener would see you and put you in again!" But the gardener did not notice; it lay there all day.

"The sunshine is delightful," said the Root, though really its glare and heat were making her feel quite dizzy.

"How hot the sun is! And how parched we are!" sighed the drooping flowers. "Now we must die, and our poor little half-formed seeds will never grow into beautiful plants." And they laid their tender faces on the hot earth and died.

The afternoon wore on. The gasping leaves and soft stems almost died too, but the coolness of evening and the night dew revived them a little; when the morning came they tried to lift themselves and live on in spite of the hot sunshine that came again.

As for the Root, she was longing now for the gardener to come and put her in the earth. She had been dried and withered by the heat, then half frozen by the cold night dew; now here was another day to face in this glare of light and cruel sunshine. She knew now that the flowers were right in saying that the life above ground would not suit her. "If the gardener does not come soon I shall die, too," she thought.

The gardener came, saw the upturned Root, and set it in its old place. "I will never grumble at my life again," said the Root as the soft cool earth closed in around her.

"How thankful we are!" whispered the leaves faintly. "Now we shall live again."

But the flowers said nothing, for they were dead.

CREEPY-CRAWLY

At first Creepy-Crawly was nothing but a tiny egg on a blade of grass; but when he hatched out into a caterpillar he was Creepy-Crawly indeed, for though he had about sixteen pairs of legs, they were all so tiny that he could not be said to walk on them. But he crawled about quite happily, and was well content with life as he found it.

"Why don't you grow long legs like me?" said the Spider. "It must be terribly slow work crawling about like that."

Creepy-Crawly did not stay to answer. Out of his body he drew two threads as fine as the spider's own, glued them together with his mouth into a rope, and dropped by the rope from the branch to the ground. He did not like Mrs. Spider.

"Well, I wouldn't wear a green coat if I were you," said an Earth-worm whom he met. "Brown is a much nicer colour."

"Brown may be best for you who live in the ground," said Creepy-Crawly, "but green is better for me. The birds would like me for dinner, you know, but they cannot see me so well if I look like the leaves I feed on."

"You should wear a hard shell on your back." said a Beetle. "You are absurdly soft."

Creepy-Crawly wriggled quickly out of the beetle's sight, and a Butterfly who saw him laughed. She said: "Better grow wings, Creepy-Crawly. They are the best means of escape from your enemies."

Creepy-Crawly looked wistfully at her as she flew off. "Yes," he said to himself, "that is what I should like--to fly through the air in that grand, free way. That would be glorious! Ah, well! I have no wings, but I may as well be as happy as I can."

Creepy-Crawly had been eating hard for weeks, but now he began to feel less and less hungry and more and more drowsy. One day he curled himself up under a dead leaf and went to sleep; there he slept on and on for week after week without waking once to eat.

As he slept his skin turned brown like the worm's, and hard like the beetle's; but inside the skin a still more wonderful change was taking place. From his body six slender jointed legs with clawed toes grew slowly out, followed by four wings, which promised to be broad and beautiful when they had room to open. From the head grew two long feelers with little knobs at their ends. Over body, head, and wings a coat of tiny, many-coloured scales spread itself, softer than down, and as beautiful as the rainbow.

Creepy-Crawly woke up at last, but he was Creepy-Crawly no longer. He pushed his way out of his hard shell and stood on the dead leaf to dry himself. He spread his wings in the sun; he shook his six jointed legs one after the other; he turned and twisted himself this way and that in his delight.

"Who would have thought I should have come to this?" he said to himself. "Now I am a Butterfly. I am like the one that spoke to me that day. I will fly through the air as she did, and find her, and show her how I have changed."

He spread his beautiful wings and rose up into the warm air, and flew away to drink honey from the flowers and to dance with his butterfly cousins.

BLACKIE

At first Blackie was only a tiny speck in an egg, but he grew so fast that he soon filled the shell. Mrs. Blackbird covered him with her warm feathered body, and turned him over every day so that he should grow evenly; and Mr. Blackbird sat on a branch and sang: "How the sun shines! How bright is the world!"

It was delightfully warm and cosy in the little shell-house, so Blackie was content for a long time. But when he had grown as big as the shell would let him, and had used up all the food that had been stored for him, he wished to come out. He pecked at the shell, and his mother heard him.

"That is well," she said; "so you are ready to come out into the world. Peck hard till you make a hole. Then poke out your head."

He pecked hard, and Mrs. Blackbird helped gently from her side. Presently a hole was made, and out popped the little head.

"Cheep!" he said. "Cheep! Cheep!"

"Push with your shoulders till you crack the shell," said his mother. He pushed and pushed, and soon the shell split, and he stepped out.

"Well, you are not very handsome," said his father, looking in over the edge of the nest, "but you will be much better looking when your feathers come."

He certainly was not handsome, for he was bald all over, and his mouth looked too big for his body. But he did not know that, so he was quite happy. "Cheep!" he said. "What a brown world it is!" For all he could see was the inside of the nest, and he thought that was the world.

"Here is a worm," said Mrs. Blackbird. How that big mouth of his opened! In the weeks that followed both father and mother had to work hard to keep it filled. But they had their reward, for Blackie grew big and strong, and his feathers came.

He could look over the top of the nest now. "Cheep! What a green world it is!" he said; for all he could see was the tree, and he thought that was the world. The wind blew, and the branches swayed to and fro and rocked the nest till he fell asleep.

"Come out and learn to fly," said his mother one day. "Stand on the edge of the nest and fly down to the branch below."

She showed him how to do it, and he peeped over the edge of the nest and watched her. But it looked such a long way to the branch that he was afraid. He crept down into the nest again and would not come out. "What nonsense!" said Mrs. Blackbird; and she tumbled him out with her beak. He landed safely on the branch, as she knew he would. Then she and Mr. Blackbird sat beside him and showed him how to grasp with his toes, and how to spread out his wings. With the greatest patience they taught him step by step to fly, leading him first from twig to twig, then from big branch to big branch, and last from tree to tree.

Then he was taught how to find his food--taught how to pull a worm out of its hole, where to look for caterpillars and grubs, and how to catch a fly on the wing. At last he knew it all, and he could earn his own living.

Then he, too, sat on a branch and sang like his father: "How the sun shines! How bright is the world!"

LITTLE BIRDS

"Pretty Dearie! Pretty Dearie!" Hear the gay father-bird sing to his wife. "Pretty Dearie! Pretty Dearie! Ours is a beautiful life.

"Sweetest Birdie! Sweetest Birdie!" Hark how he calls while she sits on her nest! "Sweetest Birdie! Sweetest Birdie! Of all the world I love you best."

THE BROWNIES

Amongst the roots of the grass in the lawn lay hundreds of tiny eggs. One by one they hatched out as the sun warmed the earth and the soft showers moistened it, and soon the grass roots were alive with tiny grubs. They crawled about, cutting the poor grass roots and stems with their hard little jaws, and at once beginning to grow fat on the pieces they bit out and swallowed. All day and every day they ate, for their one aim in life was to be big and strong. "Then by and by our wings will grow and we shall fly," they thought. They were not as brown now as they would be when their wings had grown. Only their heads and jaws were brown as yet; their soft ringed bodies and curled-up tails and six jointed legs were all grey-green.

They had a lazy time under the ground, for they had nothing to do but to burrow and eat; but that just suited them. They made such good use of their time that the master of the garden looked with despair at the brown patches in his lawn. "Those dreadful grubs!" he said. "They are spoiling my beautiful lawn."

They lived there for three or four years. Then one by one they all stopped eating. They were so fat that they could hardly move, and so drowsy that they didn't want to. So they curled themselves up and went to sleep, and did not wake for many a day.

As they slept their skins grew hard and transparent, and new ones grew underneath. Two wings grew along their sides, though there was not yet room for them to open out, and two brown shields grew to cover them.

One by one the Brownies woke up. "Our wings have come! We must go out and fly!" they said.

They stretched their dried outside skins till they cracked open down the middle of the back. Then they pushed themselves out of the opening, and crawled out under the grass blades to dry themselves in the sun. Slowly and carefully they stretched out their fine new wings, tried their feelers, and lifted their strong brown shields till they hardened in the air.

They were brown beetles now, and they felt proud of themselves. They crept about to show themselves and to look at one another, and they chattered together and made plans for flying off when they were ready.

Just as evening came they were all ready to go. They lifted their wings again and again to let the air into their bodies, then up they flew, out into the wide garden-world.

Away at the back of the house there was a patch of growing potatoes. They soon found it out. They alighted on the leaves and began at once to eat them, for they were hungry after their long sleep.

They feasted all night, but when the daylight came they slipped under the leaves and hung there out of sight. They had been so long used to the darkness under the earth that now they preferred shady corners to open daylight.

"Those dreadful brown beetles have been here and spoilt my potato plants," said the master of the garden. "I wish I could catch them." He did not know that they were hiding under the leaves quite close to him.

BRAVE ROSE-PINK

Autumn was passing, and Jack Frost was frightening all the flowers away. Even the seeds could not bear to stay above the ground, but crept underneath out of the cold. The tiny underground elves gathered them and carried them away to the Earth-mother's warm nurseries, and tucked them into soft cradles till it should be time to return them to the garden for the spring growth.

But a sweet-pea seed refused to come down. "No," she said; "I do not wish to lie in a cradle all the winter. I wish to stay here and grow. I am already sprouting, and I intend to go on." She would not be moved.

The elves went to the Earth-mother.

"There is a sweet-pea seed above the ground, Rose-Pink by name, who refuses to come below," they said. "What shall we do with her?"