Part 12

This bank we are passing is a favourite winter retreat for female humble bees. Early in the autumn they begin to scoop out a little tunnel in this grassy slope, and when it is deep enough to protect them from the frost they retire into it, and pushing up the earth behind them close up the entrance of the hole, and there lie dormant until the warmth of spring tempts them to come out. Then they may be found in great numbers on the early sallow, and other tree-blossoms, recruiting their strength, while they seek a place in some hedge-bank wherein to found a new colony.

The Carder bee forms its nest on the ground and makes a roof of interwoven moss, from which it takes its name. I once gathered the moss from such a nest by chance and saw the little mass of cells with honey in them. I went away, meaning to examine it more closely on my return, but a crow in the apple-tree overhead chanced to spy the nest and made off with it in his beak before I could rescue the honey store of the poor little bees I had so unwittingly injured.

That old tree-stump is being gradually carried away by wasps. The wood is just sufficiently decayed to afford the material of which they make their nests. You see there are several wasps busily rasping pieces of the rotten wood into convenient-sized morsels, which they can carry to the nest, there to be masticated into the papery layers of which the outer walls of the nest are formed. This walk used to have a row of grand old silver firs of great height, but each winter some of them have been blown down till only a few are left.

Some years since I noticed at the root of one of them a pile of fine sawdust more than a foot high, and found that some wood wasps were busily engaged in excavating the interior of the tree and forming tunnels in which to lay their eggs. I watched them for half an hour and found that every half-minute a wasp went in at the aperture carrying a blue-bottle or some kind of fly in its mandibles. Next day I took a friend to see the wasps, and while watching them the wind caused the immense tree-stem to sway to and fro from its base as if in the act of falling, and on examination we found it was only held in its place by a small portion of root, and though the branches were green, it must have been hollow and dead inside, which appears to be the way in which silver firs decay, and the wasps had found it out and made a delightful home in the rotten wood. With some difficulty the great tree was safely taken down, and then it was a most curious sight to see the endless chambers and galleries made in the stem, all tenanted by young wasp-grubs and half-dead flies; and all the summer they were being hatched in countless numbers. The view over our common is lovely from this point; it is golden with rich yellow gorse, giving cover to innumerable rabbits, which find their way into our garden in spite of wire fences and all that the gardener can do to keep them out. One clever little mother rabbit made her burrow deep down in a heap of sawdust close to the stable. My coachman put his arm down to the bottom of the hole and brought out a little grey furred creature, kicking and screaming with wonderful vigour in spite of its tender years. The nest was allowed to remain, and in a few days the mother removed her brood to a hole at the root of a bushy stone-pine, where the little ones frisked in and out and looked so pretty that I was won over to allow them to stay, and, by netting round the tree, we formed a miniature warren for the young family; but I fear that in course of time we may bitterly repent this step, and the numbers may increase to such an extent that pinks and lobelia may become things of the past and the rabbit warren may have to be abolished.

A fox is sometimes seen and hunted in these parts. One surprised me by leaping upon the window-sill and looking into the drawing-room. At first I could not think what it was. It had been dug out of its hole; its fur was muddy and torn, its eyes piteous in their expression, and when it ran slowly on I saw it was very lame. I ran to the window to let it in, but though it leaped up to each window in succession, they all happened to be shut, and I was quite grieved to think the poor, weary creature could find no shelter. I am no admirer of field-sports. I think they give rise to the utmost cruelty to the creatures hunted and shot, to the horses and dogs employed; and to witness torture inflicted on unoffending animals cannot but have a debasing effect on the human mind. When once any one has seen the anguish of a deer, a fox, or hare, at the end of the race, there can be no question about the cruelty of the proceeding, and to one who loves every created thing as I do, it gives the keenest pain to know how much suffering of this kind goes on during the hunting season.

There goes a cuckoo, with quite a flight of small birds pursuing him wherever he goes.

Small birds seem to have an intense hatred of jays and cuckoos, and will often fly at them in the nesting season, giving them no peace till they drive them out of the garden, knowing full well that their own broods are often devoured by the jay, and that the cuckoo has designs upon the nests.

Although we are some distance from home, I can show you one of my own bees on this furze blossom. I have a hive of Swiss, or Ligurian bees, which are said to be in some respects superior to the English species. The honey is of excellent flavour, and the first year I had far more honey from the Ligurian hive. I do not think any other hives of Ligurians are kept within five miles, and, as you see, they have a band of bright yellow on the abdomen. I can always tell my own bees when I meet with them in my walks on the common or in the lanes. I had a rather trying adventure with these bees last May. One Sunday evening we were just starting for church, about half-past six, when my little niece ran in exclaiming that there was a great bunch of bees hanging on a branch near the hives. I knew what had happened--my very irreverent bees had swarmed on this quiet Sunday evening, and they must be hived if possible.

My bonnet was soon off and the bee-dress put on, and in five minutes the bees were secured and settled into a hive. We went to church and were not even late, but--during the first prayer I heard ominous sounds of a furious bee under my dress; it was, fortunately, a partly transparent material, and glancing furtively about I saw my little friend under the skirt going up and down with an angry biz-z-z. Only the pocket-hole could release him, so I held that safely in my hand all through the service, lest the congregation might suffer the wrath of a furious bee, which in truth is no light matter, for in blind fury it will rush at the first person it meets and leave its sting in the face or hand. Happily I succeeded in bringing the bee home again, and resolved to avoid hiving swarms before church-time in future.

You see under the drooping boughs of the fir-tree yonder an old stone basin, well known to all the birds in the neighbourhood, for there they always find a supply of fresh water and food of various kinds to suit all tastes. As it is opposite the dining-room window, it is very interesting to see a tame jay and sundry squirrels enjoying the acorns which were collected for them last autumn and stored up so as to keep the basin well supplied all through the winter and spring, until other food should be plentiful. Finches, robins, and sparrows find wheat and crumbs to their taste, and take their daily bath not without some squabbling as to who shall have it first--a difficulty which is sometimes settled by a portly blackbird appearing on the scene and scattering the smaller folk, whilst he takes his early tubbing and sends up showers of spray in the process. Very pretty are the scenes on that same stone basin when in early summer a mother bird brings her little tribe of downy, chirping babes, and feeds each little gaping mouth with some suitable morsels from the store she finds there.

A sheaf of corn in winter is also a great boon to the starved-out birdies, when snow has long deprived them of their natural food, and the water supply has to be often renewed on freezing days, for many a bird dies in winter from lack of water, all its usual supplies being frozen. The tameness of birds in severe weather is a touching sign of their distress, and a mute appeal to us to help them.

"The fowls of heaven Tam'd by the cruel season, crowd around The winnowing store, and claim the little boon Which Providence assigns them."

It is pleasant to think that they seldom appeal in vain. "Crumbs for the birds" are scattered by kindly little hands everywhere in winter, and in many a house a pet sonsie little robin is a cherished visitor, always welcome to his small share of the good things of this life.

Our ramble might be indefinitely prolonged and still be full of interest and instruction, but in these simple remarks enough has been shown, I trust, to lead many to think and observe closely every, even the minutest, thing that catches their attention whilst out for a ramble in lanes and fields, even a microscopic moss upon an old wall has been suggestive of many lovely thoughts, with which I will conclude our ramble and this chapter.

"It was not all a tale of eld, That fairies, who their revels held By moonlight, in the greenwood shade Their beakers of the moss-cups made. The wondrous light which science burns Reveals those lovely jewelled urns! Fair lace-work spreads from roughest stems And shows each tuft a mine of gems. Voices from the silent sod, Speaking of the Perfect God.

Fringeless, or fringed, and fringed again, No single leaflet formed in vain; What wealth of heavenly wisdom lies Within one moss-cup's mysteries! And few may know what silvery net, Down in its mimic depths is set To catch the rarest dews that fall Upon the dry and barren wall. Voices from the silent sod, Speaking of the Perfect God."

L. N. R.

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