The swarm seems to be guided by a line of couriers, which may be seen
(at least at the outset) constantly going and coming. As they take a
direct course, there is always some chance of following them to the
tree, unless they go a long distance, and some obstruction, like a wood
or a swamp or a high hill, intervenes,--enough chance, at any rate, to
stimulate the lookers-on to give vigorous chase as long as their wind
holds out. If the bees are successfully followed to their retreat, two
plans are feasible,--either to fell the tree at once, and seek to hive
them, perhaps bring them home in the section of the tree that contains
the cavity; or to leave the tree till fall, then invite your neighbors
and go and cut it, and see the ground flow with honey. The former
course is more business-like; but the latter is the one usually
recommended by one's friends and neighbors.

Perhaps nearly one third of all the runaway swarms leave when no one is
about, and hence are unseen and unheard, save, perchance, by some
distant laborers in the field, or by some youth plowing on the side of
the mountain, who hears an unusual humming noise, and sees the swarm
dimly whirling by overhead, and, maybe, gives chase; or he may simply
catch the sound, when he pauses, looks quickly around, but sees
nothing. When he comes in at night he tells how he heard or saw a swarm
of bees go over; and perhaps from beneath one of the hives in the
garden a black mass of bees has disappeared during the day.

They are not partial as to the kind of tree,--pine, hemlock, elm,
birch, maple, hickory,--any tree with a good cavity high up or low
down. A swarm of mine ran away from the new patent hive I gave them,
and took up their quarters in the hollow trunk of an old apple-tree
across an adjoining field. The entrance was a mouse-hole near the
ground.