Part 6 (1/2)
CHAPTER TWELVE.
BUSY BEES.
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine round-topped straw hives there were at Greenlawn--hives full of such rich, thick honey, and such beautiful combs, and all about these round heavy hives the bees would hum and buzz of a hot day, flying in and out loaded with honey and pollen; and outside some of the hives the bees would hang down like great pockets made of insects, all hanging to one another; and there they hung, getting ready to swarm and fly off to a new home; but they did not know how to choose one for themselves, for they would only fly off to a tree and hang there all of a lump, when the master of Greenlawn would take a nice, clean, sweet hive and sweep them all into it, and set them on a board by the side of the other hives. It was such a nice, sweet place, all amongst flowers, and the scent of the honey would come from the hives so strongly that very often the birds would come and think they would like a taste, while the wasps would even go so far as to creep in and steal some of the luscious food. As to flies, they would come without end, and if they had not been afraid of the bees they would soon have run off with all the sweet honey. But one day there was a very serious bluebottle who had sat upon the end of a sweet pea watching the bees so busy, while he had been doing nothing all day but make a noise, and he felt at last so ashamed of himself, that when he saw a bee come to the flower he was on, and put his long trunk into it to find whether there was any honey, he began to buzz very loudly; and the bee, looking up to know what he meant, heard him say--
”Little bee, buzzing about in the air, For once be not busy, a moment pray spare, And tell me, pray tell me, how honey you make From the flowerets of garden, soft meadow, and brake.
You rise with the sun, and your gossamer wing Bears you swiftly away where the heather-bells spring; Whence you come heavy laden with nectary spoil, For the sweet winter stores of your summer of toil.
”Oh! I would be busy; and lay up in store For the days of the winter when cold showers pour, And the wild wintry breezes sweep flowers away, While the sun sets in gloom o'er the dim-shadowed day; But I'm a poor bluebottle, spoken of ill; Whilst you are protected, all bear me ill-will; And if I escape from each murderous blow, The first cutting frost lays the bluebottle low.
”So little bee buzzing, a lesson pray give; Remember the motto to 'live and let live;' For one moment teach me sweet honey to make, That again in the spring-time with you I may wake.”
”Buzz,” said the bee, ”that's all very fine, but you were never meant to make honey. Go and do your duty, and lay eggs in the bad meat to make maggots to eat it up, so that we may not have the nasty stuff lying about. I daresay you think we have a very fine time of it amongst the honey; but, don't you know, sometimes somebody comes with the brimstone and smothers us all, and takes the honey away? How should you like that, old blue-boy?”
”Worse and worse--wuz-z-z-ooz-wooz,” said the bluebottle, and off he flew, and never sang any more songs to the bees; while the old bee burst out laughing so heartily at the way in which the bluebottle was frightened, that he let all the bee-bread tumble out of his baskets, and before he could pick it up, a bee from another hive flew off with it.
”There,” said the first bee, ”that comes of laughing at other people, and now I've got all my work to do over again; but, oh dear! how he did bustle off when I told him about the brimstone.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
COLD WEATHER.
At last the merry summer-time was gone, and the flowers began to hang their heads in the gardens, looking wet and soiled; for every now and then the cold wind would come with a rush and a roar and knock the poor things about dreadfully; sometimes they would be struck right down on the ground, where they would lie, never to get up any more. Sometimes, however, the sun would come out to cheer them up again, but he was not at all warm; and then the nights began to grow so long and cold that the flowers had nearly made up their minds to go to sleep for the winter, when Jack Frost sent word one night that he was coming, and his messenger left such a cold chill everywhere that he had been, that the flowers all went to sleep at once, and the leaves on the trees, turning yellow with fright, began to shake and s.h.i.+ver, and tumble off as hard as ever they could tumble, till they lay in great rustling heaps all over the gravel walks, where they were swept up and carried off into the back-yard. And then all the birds were as busy as ever they could be: the young ones were now strong on the wing, and there were such meetings and congregations in wood and field--on lawn and in tree--in hedgerow and down even in the ditches. The martins and swallows all said ”Good-bye,” and were off in a hurry; and all the other summer visitors who were lagging behind, when they saw the swallows go, went off as hard as ever they could, not even stopping to take any cold flies with them, they were in such a hurry. Sparrows and finches, they all made excursion parties, and went feasting in the stubble-fields; starlings, jackdaws, and rooks, they went worm-picking in the wet marshlands; and all the thrush family went off to the fields and hedgerows, seeking berries and fruits that had now grown tender and sweet; and so at last Greenlawn began to look very deserted all day, but it was not so of a night, for there would be a fine noise in the ivy, where all the sparrows came home to roost, for they were in such high spirits that they could not keep quiet, but kept on chatter, chatter, till it grew so dark they could not see to open their beaks. As to the starlings, they came home by scores to the warm, thick cedar, and there they whistled and chattered until the moon began to s.h.i.+ne, when they, too, went off to sleep; and so, wherever there was a snug, warm spot at Greenlawn, the birds came back in the cold wintry nights to sleep--flying far-off in the day-time, but always returning at night.
They were hard times for the poor birds when Jack Frost had it all his own way; for in his sharp, spiteful, nip-toes fas.h.i.+on he would freeze and freeze everything until it was all as hard as steel; and then, so as to make sure that by hard work and bill-chipping no worms were dug out, he would powder the ground all over with white snow, so that all the footmarks were stamped upon it as the birds walked along.
s.h.i.+ver-s.h.i.+ver-s.h.i.+ver; ah! it was cold! and food was so scarce that no one could get anything to eat but the robin-redbreast; and he would go up to the house, and, sitting upon the snow-covered sills, peep in at the windows with his great round staring eyes, until the master's little girls would come and open the sash, and shake all the crumbs out of their pinafores; so that the poor cold bird would often get a good hearty meal.
Sometimes the sun would come out and s.h.i.+ne upon the snow-wreaths, and they would glitter and sparkle, and turn of the most beautiful colours; while the trees were covered with frost-work that looked more brilliant than the finest silver that was ever worked.
But, ah! the poor birds! it was a sad time for them; and they would huddle up together in flocks; and very often got to be so cold and hungry that the country people picked them up half dead, with their feathers all ruffled up and their beautiful little bright, beady eyes half-shut. Ah! those were sad times at Greenlawn; and the master would gladly have helped the poor things if he could; but generally they used to fly right off, miles away, so that very often not a bird was to be seen but Bob Robin, who kept hopping about the doors and windows.
But Jack Frost did not care a bit, for he loved freezing; and when the winter nights were come, with the moon s.h.i.+ning, and the stars twinkling and blinking ever so high up, Jack would put on his skates and go skimming over the country, breathing on people's window-panes, and making them all over ferny frost-work; hanging icicles round the eaves of the houses; making the roads so hard that they would sound hollow and rattle as the wheels pa.s.sed over; and turning the ponds, lakes, and rivers into hard ringing ice. Then the frost would hang upon the labourers' hair, and little k.n.o.bs of ice upon the bristles about the horses' muzzles; while some of the branches of the trees would become so loaded with the white clinging snow that they would snap off and fall to the ground. Away would troop the birds in the day-time then to feast upon the scarlet berries of the holly, the pearly dew-like drops of the mistletoe, or the black coaly berries that grew upon the ivy-tod; and away and away they would fly again with wild and plaintive cries as Jack Frost would send a cutting blast in amongst them to scare them away.
How the poor birds would look at the man cutting logs of wood to take to the master's house; and how they would watch the blue smoke and sparks come curling out of the wide chimneys. In the night the wild geese would fly over to the moor, crying ”Clang-clang-clang,” and frightening many a s.h.i.+vering sleeper with their wild shriek; and then the long-necked birds would dart down from their high swoop to some lonely lake in the wild moor, there to sit upon the cold ice, pluming themselves ere they started again for some spot where the frost king had not all his own way.
Old Ogrebones, the kingfisher, lay snug at the bottom of his hole in the bank; while all the tender birds were far-off in milder climes, where flies were to be caught, and where the sun shone bright and warm. As to the poor ducks, they could do nothing but paddle and straddle about over the surface of the gla.s.sy pond, for almost as soon as the hard ice was broken for them to get water, it all froze together again; and in spite of their thick coats of warm down and feathers, they said it was almost too cold to be borne. The rooks had gone down to the sea-side and the mouths of the rivers to pick up a living when the tide went down; while all the other birds that were not in the fields made friends with the sparrows, and went in flocks to the farmyards, where they could find stray grains of corn, and run off with them, chased by the old c.o.c.ks and hens. And still Jack Frost had it all his own way, and stuck his cold, sharp teeth into everything and everybody--even into the foreign thrushes and grey crows that came over from Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, and nipped them so that they all said they had better have stayed at home.
Now, all this could not have been borne, only that Jack Frost would go to sleep sometimes, and then down would come a soft, warm rain that would wash away the snow and melt the ice, and soften the ground so that food became plentiful again; and the birds would set to and make up for lost time by having such a feast as would make them better able to bear Jack Frost's next fast, and strong enough to set his sharp teeth at defiance.
They were fine times for feasting when the thaw had set in, for then, as the earth grew soft, the worms would come crawling out to have a stretch, after being asleep beneath the iron-bound earth. As for the rooks, they ate until they could hardly move, and gormandised in a way that could only be excused in things that could not get their meals at regular times. ”Snip-snap” went the bills all over the marshlands, and gobble-gobble went the poor worms; and so for about a week the birds had such a feast that their skins all got quite tight with the thick jacket of fat that was spread beneath them to keep the cold out, and all their feathers began to stick up so that they had plenty of work to smooth them down. But such weather did not last long, for soon Jack Frost would wake up again, quite cross to think how long he had slept, and then on he would put his sharp steel skates again, and away over the country he would skim with all the land turning to iron wherever he went, and looking as if the keen old fellow had been sprinkling diamonds and emeralds and pearls all over the ground. As to the sheep, they would quite rattle with the k.n.o.bs of ice upon their wool, while the turnips they were nibbling out in the fields were like s...o...b..a.l.l.s. And away skimmed Jack Frost by the light of the bright moon, while all the stars kept laughing and winking at his freaks, and soon again all the country was powdered over with snow, and the water all turned to ice.
Then at night, when the cold cutting wind would hum outside the doors and sing through all the c.h.i.n.ks, trying to get in, people would draw the red curtains close, and heap up the dry logs of wood upon the fire till the bright blue flames would dance and flicker, and flicker and dance, and roar up the chimney; but all the time sending such warmth and comfort through the rooms that the wind would give up trying, and, knowing that it could not battle with such a warm fire, would rush off again over the bare woods and fields to help Jack Frost, and bear away the words of the song he was singing, so that everybody could hear it.
For the icy fellow as he skimmed along would laugh and shout to see how everybody was afraid of him, and lighted fires to keep him away; and then he would sing,--
”I kiss cheeks and make them rosy; I make people wrap up cosy; I bring chilblains, chaps, and nipping; I send people quickly tripping.
See my breath all silver lacing; Feel my touch how cold and bracing; Come and race o'er ground so snowy; Come and trip 'mid breezes blowy.
I'll make little eyes look brightly; I'll make little hearts beat lightly; And when cheeks grow red as cherry, Then will echo voices merry.