Gray-beard turned in his chair, his eyes rested upon the boy, who was still looking fixedly out of the window. Then he rose, stepped softly up to Warren, seized him by the shoulders and shook him violently, saying, "Are you asleep?" "Swarming!" rang out the last word of the sentence which Warren was making a desperate effort to utter. Gray-beard, following the eyes of the lad, looked out of the window, "Quick, boys, to the dining-room, take anything you can make a noise with!" he exclaimed, as he sprang to the door, threw it open with a bang and disappeared. We leaped over desks, and tumbled over each other as we rushed with impetuous haste to the dining-room. Brush caught up an enormous tin pan, Edwin a milk pail, and I the school triangle; the rest of the boys took tin pans and plates, or whatever they could lay their hands on, and we all ran out into the yard. Warren was already following the humming black cloud, ringing the school-bell with all his might. We caught up with him, and began beating on the tin pans with our knuckles, keeping up a constant yelling like a lot of savages. The noise we made was enough to drive the bees and ourselves insane. It was bedlam let loose. On we went through the barnyard, up the hill, and into the woods, closely following the flying black mass. Three boys carrying small mirrors kept throwing flashes of light into the swarm. The bees made a straight line for a tall oak, hovered over the end of a high branch, and then settled on it. We gathered around the tree, and continued our unearthly noise until Gray-beard, with a box and a saw on his shoulder, and a coil of rope on his arm, came up puffing and all in a perspiration. "Have they settled?" he asked, shading his eyes and looking up into the tree. "Yes, there they are," answered Brush, pointing to the writhing black mass on the branch. "Who can climb?" said Gray-beard, looking around among the boys. No one answered. After a while Edwin spoke up, "Lester climb tree like wild-cat." Lester turned and looked daggers at him. Brush and I nudged each other and giggled. Edwin was playing a joke on Lester. "Come," said Gray-beard, "there's no time to be lost." And he proceeded to tie the end of the rope around the waist of Lester, who had not recovered from his astonishment and was given no time to put in a disclaimer to the title of climber. Gray-beard lifted the lad up as high as he could, then the boy began to climb. He went up slowly but surely, dragging the rope after him. Edwin shouted words of encouragement. "That's good, go ahead!" he would exclaim as the climber made now and again six inches or so. "Wait till I get down, I show you!" Lester called back. Then Edwin turned to us and grinned.