The innocency of the bee is one of its lofty attributes, no less than its miraculous art. Its sting is simply a defensive and indispensable weapon, not against man-with whom, of its own accord, it does not wage war--but against the cruel wasps, its terrible enemies. The bee, on the other hand, injures none. It does not live by death; its inoffensive life does not demand the sacrifice of other lives. It stimulates innumerable existences; it vivifies and fecundates them. There is no uncultivated desert, no wild, bare region which it does not animate,--where it does not infuse fresh vigour into the languishing vegetation, urging the plants to bud, watching over and inspecting them. It reproaches them with their slothfulness; and as soon as they open to the influence of love-these poor dumb virgins!--it establishes between them the requisite interpreters, carries off in its murmurs their pollen and perfume, and harmonizes the aromas which are their blossoms of thought. This process begins in the month of March. When an uncertain but already potent sun reawakes the sleeping sap, the tiny flowers of the fields, the wild violet, the Easter-daisy of the sward, the buttercup of the hedgerow, the precocious gillyflower, expanding, perfume the air. But their expansion lasts only for a moment. Barely open at noon, by three o'clock they fold themselves up again, and veil their shivering stamens. In this brief interval of gentle heat you may see a little wan-looking creature, completely clad but very chilly, which also ventures to unfurl its wings. The bee quits its city, in the knowledge that the manna is ready for it and its little ones. A little matter then, it is true, but most cradles are empty at this epoch. The great fecundity of the mother bee still lurks concealed in her bosom. The regular and rapid incubation, which might suffice to create a world, will not commence until a much later period,--the sunny time of May. How admirable is this agreement! Most of the shivering flowers, like the shivering bee, wait a more equable season before they bare to the sun their corolla, too delicate to endure the caprices of April.