“Has to poke his nose pretty close into things to see them?” said Uncle Oscar. “If he wanted to see exactly how a bee looked, for instance, he would have to poke his nose almost into a bee, would he?” “Yes, that’s so,” I said. “Well, you notice this the next time you look at a bee,” said Uncle Oscar. “The part of a bee back of its wings--its abdomen--is striped. When a bee goes out for honey, it goes for two things--a square meal for itself and some honey or some pollen to take back to the hive. A bee is greedy, too; it stuffs itself while the chance is good. If you watch a bee, you’ll see that the longer it feeds, the bigger and longer its abdomen gets. Especially longer. As it fills up, the stripes get farther apart. That’s how Jibby ‘smelled’ that bee, George. He poked his nose close to it so his eyes could see it, and he saw that its abdomen was swelled and stretched as much as it could be. That meant that the bee was ready to call it a day’s work and go back to the hive. So your Jibby knew that when the bee left the flower it would probably make a ‘bee-line’ for home. And he was right. That’s how he ‘smelled’ that ‘pilot’ bee. It wasn’t a pilot bee, and he didn’t smell it. So you and Wampus want to look out for Jibby Jones. This bee business makes me think he’s going to win the prize, or thinks he is. He’s a mighty smart boy.” The next time I saw Jibby, which was about half an hour after that, I asked him: “Well, how’s the old smeller getting along, Jibby? Is it going to win the prize?” “I’ll tell you, George,” Jibby said, “I have hopes. I don’t say I’ll win, but I’m trying.” “It will be an awful thing if it is windy this afternoon and you have to adhesive your nose shut against your cheek, won’t it?” I laughed. Jibby put his finger to his nose and wiggled his nose at me, and then we both laughed. “I know how you smelled the pilot bee, Jibby,” I told him. “Do you?” he said, and it did not seem to bother him at all. “Just see if you and Wampus can see how I smell out the best and biggest fish this afternoon.” The afternoon turned out to be the best sort for fishing. It was cloudy, but not too cloudy, and a nice riffle on the water, but not too rough. The place Wampus’s Uncle Oscar picked out for the contest was the slough at the upper end of our island, and that meant we would have to fish from skiffs, which is about the best way, anyhow. There was not much of a gathering to see the contest. You can’t get mothers to be very interested in such things, except to say, “Oh, how nice!” or, “Oh, I’m sorry!” after it is all over, and our fathers--all except Jibby’s--went down to town every day to work. So the audience was just Wampus’s Uncle Oscar and Jibby’s father. They walked up to the slough together while we were rowing up, and they sat on the bank and watched us fish. We each had a skiff. When we got to the slough, Jibby was ahead, and he ran his skiff ashore and waited for us.