Woodside Part 4

"Because it is smaller and weaker, and it is later in the year, so they have not such a long time to get honey to keep them through the winter.

They will generally die off, if they are not fed."

"Suppose the queen dies, what do the bees do then, grandpapa?"

"They are greatly concerned; they run about the hive touching every bee they meet with their little horns or feelers. Then, when all the bees know of their loss, they set to work to feed one of the grubs in the royal cells with a particular kind of food, and a young queen after due time makes her appearance. They take great care of her, and obey her as they did the old queen."

VI.

_WASPS AND THEIR WAYS._

"An elegant shape is yours, Sir Wasp, And delicate is your wing; Your armour is brave, in black and gold; But we do not like your sting."--C. H.

The next morning Jack went to see how the new hive had settled, and he found everything going on as usual. The bees were very busy, flying in and out, and working hard to build the cells of their new home.

The gardener was working near, and he said, "Master Jack, did you ever see a wasp's nest?"

Jack shook his head.

"Well, now, if you come into my cottage, I'll show you one this evening.

It's not a very good one, for it got broken digging it out of the ground in one of the garden paths. We'd been terribly plagued with wasps for weeks, and it was some time before we could find the nest. We watched them go into a hole in the ground; so one evening when they'd all gone to bed we got some pitch and brimstone, and laid them with some lighted sticks on the top of the hole. The wasps woke up, and came out to see what was going on; but they were smothered by the brimstone smoke, and were soon done for. The next day we dug out the nest.

"Wasps are great pests, Master Jack, I can tell you. They are very fond of honey, and they go into the bee-hives to steal it, especially when the mornings and evenings get cool, and the bees are not watching at the holes of their hives, because they've gone inside to keep themselves warm.

"The wasps spoil a lot of fruit. If there's one peach finer than another, they know it; and as for the plums, green-gages in particular, why, they are as mad after them as the birds are for the cherries. What with the caterpillars and slugs being after the vegetables, and the birds and the wasps making such havoc with the fruit, I wonder sometimes how we ever get any for ourselves."

"There always seems plenty of fruit and vegetables, though," said Jack.

"Well, yes," said the gardener, "maybe. The birds do help us with caterpillars and slugs, I'm bound to own; and then we are always on the look-out to destroy wasps: and as to the birds, I dodge them with netting; and sometimes we take the nests out of the fruit-trees, as much as to tell them to go elsewhere."

That evening Jack went into the gardener's cottage and saw the wasp's nest. It looked like the cells of bees made in whity-brown paper.

"What is it made of?" asked Jack; "it isn't wax."

"Well, I've heard that the wasp, which has very strong jaws, bites bits of wood off posts and rails, and moistens them by chewing them into a kind of paper, and then makes a comb of it like what you see here."

"I wish I had seen this wasp's nest taken."

"No, Master Jack; why, you'd be in bed at that time: besides, I don't suppose your grandmamma would have let you go, even if you had been here, for you might have been stung. It's rather a touchy job, is taking a wasp's nest,--very different from hiving bees; we give them a home, but we take one from the wasps.

"If the queen bee falls into the new hive, the bees are right enough--they are sure to go where she is; but the wasps are naturally angered and frightened at being suffocated out of their home. So, I say, keep clear of wasps' nests; those jobs are best done on the quiet."

"Was anybody stung when this nest was taken?"

"Yes, your grandma was. She's naturally curious about such things, and came with your grandpa to see the sight. One half-stupified wasp settled on her hair, and she didn't know it; but after she got back to the house it revived a bit and moved, and she, not knowing what it was, touched it, and it stung her badly on the top of her head. I don't think wasps will sting unless they are touched; but they are such creepy things that you don't always know where they are, and you are apt to touch them without meaning to do so."

The next morning at breakfast Jack was talking about the wasp's nest that he had seen on the evening before at the gardener's cottage.

Grandma remarked, "There is a kind of wasp called the mason wasp, which bores holes several inches deep in sand-banks. The inside of this long narrow pa.s.sage is covered with a gummy paste which the wasp makes with her mouth. Here she lays her eggs, and then brings some green caterpillars into the holes, ready for the young wasps to eat when they come out of the egg. Then she closes the holes by a ball of sand, so that nothing can get in to eat the young grub. Sometimes these wasps choose a brick wall instead of a sand-bank for their eggs.

"A friend of mine watched one of these wasps in a wall in her garden.

She saw the wasp go into a small round hole in the mortar between the bricks. After a few minutes she walked out of the hole, turned round, and went in again backwards. There she stayed, her little horns and bright eyes being all that could be seen of the wasp. My friend tried to make the wasp come out of the hole, but nothing could move her; so then she had to go away, but not before she had put a mark by the spot.

"The next morning she went back to the wall and found the wasp had gone, and had carefully and cleverly covered up her hole with what looked like mortar.

"The lady then took a pen-knife and sc.r.a.ped away this door to the hole.

She then put in a fine crochet-hook, and out tumbled no fewer than fifteen small green living caterpillars. At last, quite at the back of the hole, she found a small oval thing, something like an ant's egg, only more transparent. That was the wasp's egg; and the caterpillars were for its food when it was hatched, which would be in about three weeks."

"Don't wasps make honey?" asked Annie.

"No; the common wasp feeds her very young grubs upon the sweet juice of ripe fruit; in fact they like fruit over-ripe, and that is why they choose plums and pears and peaches that have fallen down to the ground.

It is dangerous to eat any ripe fruit that has fallen, without first looking to see if there is a wasp inside it.

"But the young wasps soon want green caterpillars and flies to eat, and many a blue-bottle fly is killed by wasps."

"If wasps don't store up honey for the winter, what do they live upon when there are no insects about?" asked Mary.

"When the fruit is all gone, and the nights get cold, about the beginning of October, then some instinct tells them what to do, for only a few of them live through the winter.

"The wasps cease to bring in any more food for the young. They tear open the cells and expose the young grubs to the weather, when they die, or the birds eat them. Generally they pinch them to death, for they will not let them live to die of starvation; and while they are in this state they do not feel pain. So what looks like cruelty is really kindness.

"The full-grown wasps soon become sleepy with cold and die off, all but the few which live to be the mothers of the wasps next year."

VII.

_CHARLEY FOSTER'S PETS._

"Sweet is the love which Nature brings."--WORDSWORTH.

On the following Sat.u.r.day afternoon the children went to see their cousins.

As soon as they arrived, Tom said to Jack, "I saw Charley Foster yesterday, and told him we would go to see him this afternoon. I asked him that, if he had any birds' eggs to spare, would he give them to you, that you might take them back with you to London. He said he should be most happy to do so; and that we had better stop till after tea, and go home in the cool of the evening. So," continued Tom, "as soon as you're ready we'll be off."

"I'm ready now," said Jack; so the boys started for Charley Foster's house, which was about half a mile off, along the upper edge of the wood, so the walk was a pleasant one.

Presently they saw two men come out of the wood with large, square-looking packages, covered over with black linen.

"What are those men doing?" asked Jack; "and what have they got in those packages?"

"They are bird-catchers, and those are the traps and cages for the birds. It's a downright shame to keep a thing with wings in a cage. I can't see what pleasure it can be to listen to their song when they are shut up like that. I like plenty of room myself, and so do birds," said Tom.

"What birds have those men been catching?"