precipices, for the eye can plainly see what is before us. As the
afternoon sun gets lower the bees are seen with wonderful distinctness.
They fly toward and under the sun and are in a strong light, while the
near woods which form the background are in deep shadow. They look
like large luminous motes. Their swiftly vibrating, transparent wings
surround their bodies with a shining nimbus that makes them visible for
a long distance. They seem magnified many times. We see them bridge
the little gulf between us and the woods, then rise up over the
tree-tops with their burdens, swerving neither to the right hand nor to
the left. It is almost pathetic to see them labor so, climbing the
mountain and unwittingly guiding us to their treasures. When the sun
gets down so that his direction corresponds exactly with the course of
the bees, we make the plunge. It proves even harder climbing than we
had anticipated; the mountain is faced by a broken and irregular wall
of rock, up which we pull ourselves slowly and cautiously by main
strength. In half an hour, the perspiration streaming from every pore,
we reach the summit. The trees here are all small, a second growth,
and we are soon convinced the bees are not here. Then down we go on
the other side, clambering down the rocky stairways till we reach quite
a broad plateau that forms something like the shoulder of the mountain.
On the brink of this there are many large hemlocks, and we scan them
closely and rap upon them with our ax. But not a bee is seen or heard;
we do not seem as near the tree as we were in the fields below; yet if
some divinity would only whisper the fact to us we are within a few
rods of the coveted prize, which is not in one of the large hemlocks or
oaks that absorb our attention, but in an old stub or stump not six
feet high, and which we have seen and passed several times without
giving it a thought. We go farther down the mountain and beat about to
the right and left and get entangled in brush and arrested by
precipices, and finally as the day is nearly spent, give up the search