THE QUEEN BEE

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."