door in his front. It consisted first of Enoch the
trapper, carrying a spade on his shoulder and a lantern dangling in his
hand; then came Mrs. Day, the light of the lantern revealing that she
bore in her arms curious objects about a foot long, in the form of Latin
crosses (made of lath and brown paper dipped in brimstone--called matches
by bee-masters); next came Miss Day, with a shawl thrown over her head;
and behind all, in the gloom, Mr. Frederic Shiner.

Dick, in his consternation at finding Shiner present, was at a loss how
to proceed, and retired under a tree to collect his thoughts.

"Here I be, Enoch," said a voice; and the procession advancing farther,
the lantern's rays illuminated the figure of Geoffrey, awaiting their
arrival beside a row of bee-hives, in front of the path. Taking the
spade from Enoch, he proceeded to dig two holes in the earth beside the
hives, the others standing round in a circle, except Mrs. Day, who
deposited her matches in the fork of an apple-tree and returned to the
house. The party remaining were now lit up in front by the lantern in
their midst, their shadows radiating each way upon the garden-plot like
the spokes of a wheel. An apparent embarrassment of Fancy at the
presence of Shiner caused a silence in the assembly, during which the
preliminaries of execution were arranged, the matches fixed, the stake
kindled, the two hives placed over the two holes, and the earth stopped
round the edges. Geoffrey then stood erect, and rather more, to
straighten his backbone after the digging.

"They were a peculiar family," said Mr. Shiner, regarding the hives
reflectively.

Geoffrey nodded.

"Those holes will be the grave of thousands!" said Fancy. "I think 'tis
rather a cruel thing to do."

Her father shook his head. "No," he said, tapping the hives to shake the
dead bees from their cells, "if you suffocate 'em this way, they only die
once: if you fumigate 'em in the new way, they come to life again, and
die o' starvation; so the pangs o' death be twice upon 'em."

"I incline to Fancy's notion," said Mr. Shiner, laughing lightly.

"The proper way to take honey, so that the bees be neither starved nor
murdered, is a puzzling matter," said the keeper steadily.

"I should like never to take it from them," said Fancy.

"But 'tis the money," said Enoch musingly. "For without money man is a
shadder!"

The lantern-light had disturbed many bees that had escaped from hives
destr