Do you not think the new bee will like its gay, pink cell? One kind of bee likes red poppy leaves best. She cuts the bits of leaf quite small. There is a bee in Brazil, which makes a large nest, like a great bag. It is full of round balls. The balls are full of honey. The wax and honey of this bee are of a dark color. [Illustration: JACK OF ALL TRADES.] One kind of bee has no sting. Would you like that bee best? The tree bee is also called the wild bee. This bee takes an old tree with a hollow trunk. It cleans out more and more of the old, dead wood, and builds nice combs. A tall tree may be full of combs, from root to top. In such a tree, more than one swarm will live and work. Each swarm has its queen, and keeps in its own place. Smoke makes bees fall, as if dead. People drive bees off with the smoke from a fire of wood or paper. When I was a little girl, our bees sometimes swarmed on the fourth of July. I had to stay home and watch them, and I am sure I did not like that. LESSON XXVI. MORE ABOUT BEES. Would you like to own bees? Once I knew a boy who had some bees. He kept them in a room, at the top of his house. He left the window open, and the bees came and went as they chose. A swarm of bees costs about five dollars. Each year it may gain for you five dollars, or more, by honey, and a new swarm. If you live in the city, you cannot so easily keep bees. Why not? They could not find the right food. They need to fly in the field or in a garden, so that they can get the honey and the yellow dust of flowers. They need to fly where they can get the thick gum from trees to line their cells. If you have a hive of bees, you should learn to watch them well. Like Huber, you may find out some new things. We do not yet know all about bees. We could learn more than is now known about drones. If you stand by a hive, the bees will not hurt you if you keep still, and do not get in their way to the door as they go in and out. Bees lay up for winter more honey than they need. So the bee-keepers take out much of it to eat or to sell. They must leave some for the bees. If too much comb is taken out, the bees must be fed. You can give them sugar or some sweet stuff. Bees like flour made of peas. They cannot feed young bees if they do not have sweet dust or flour. They cannot make wax if they have no sweet food. They cannot line their cells, nor seal them well, if they have no strong gum from trees. I know some people who think bees like to hear a song, and so sit near the hives and sing to them. But bees, really, love color, and sweet smell, and nice tastes, and do not care much for any noise. LESSON XXVII. THE SPIDER AND HIS DRESS. Flies, wasps, bees and ants are insects. Insects have six legs, and their bodies have three parts. An insect is at first a tiny egg. From the egg comes a grub, and the grub turns to a full-grown wasp, or fly, or bee.