I felt very comfortable in my pretty house, and Tiger informed me with great satisfaction that no one had been in his tent during our absence, in accordance with a promise I gave him when we set out. For some days we hardly left the fort, but enjoyed a rest. Tiger tanned the skins we had brought home. I stuffed my condor, at which my young friend was greatly amazed, and firmly declared that I restored the bird to life. After this we rolled cigars, made new clothes, repaired our saddles and bridles, and employed ourselves with the thousand domestic jobs which gather even during a short absence. But after we had attended to the chief matters, several wants became visible which we could only satisfy on the prairie. Thus, among others, our substitute for sugar, honey, was expended, and at the supper table we resolved on going out on this hunt the next morning, if it was fine. The morning dawned bright and calm, and both conditions are required for a winter bee hunt, as at this season the bees only work in warm weather, and their course cannot be watched when the wind is blowing hard. We got ready immediately after breakfast, Tiger and I, armed as usual, but Antonio and one of my colonists provided with heavy sharp axes and buckets, while Jack carried two empty casks, a copper kettle, large wooden spoons, and a tin funnel. Thus we trotted over the spangled prairie across to Mustang Creek, crossed it and its thick wood by a broad buffalo path, and then rode down the prairie to a fork formed by the forest on an affluent of the Mustang, joining that on the latter river. Here we halted, stuck a long pole, on which a small tin frying-pan was fastened, into the ground, lit dry touchwood in it, and laid on the top a piece of comb in which some honey remained. Not far from this we put up another pole with a paper smeared with honey upon it. The smoke of the boiling wax and honey serves the bees cruising over the prairie as a guide to the paper, and soon the busy gatherers arrive from all the bee-trees in the neighbourhood, load themselves as heavily as they can, and then go straight home in a direct line. The hunter now observes in which direction the greatest number of the insects swarm, because this leads him to expect a richer tree as well as a shorter distance to go. When he has decided on his route, he follows the swarm with his bait as far as he can see it, then puts up the pole again and waits till they settle, or the honey ones move and then fly home. Thus he follows the industrious insects, till by their restless activity they show him the spot where their treasures, collected during many years, are concealed, and he then disturbs the colony with cruel hand, robs it of its laboriously gathered stores, kills thousands of the colonists, and drives the rest away homeless.