ost as brief a time as it takes to relate it, the whole swarm
had followed the queen into his hat. Being near a stone wall, he coolly
deposited his prize upon it, quickly disengaged himself from the
accommodating bees, and returned for a hive. The explanation of this
singular circumstance no doubt is, that the queen, unused to such long
and heavy flights, was obliged to alight from very exhaustion. It is
not very unusual for swarms to be thus found in remote fields,
collected upon a bush or branch of a tree.

When a swarm migrates to the woods in this manner, the individual bees,
as I have intimated, do not move in right lines or straight forward,
like a flock of birds, but round and round, like chaff in a whirlwind.
Unitedly they form a humming, revolving, nebulous mass, ten or fifteen
feet across, which keeps just high enough to clear all obstacles,
except in crossing deep valleys, when, of course, it may be very high.
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