Chapter XX - Page 2

it on the comb. Indifferent as he appeared, however, he used what was perhaps the highest degree of his art in selecting this insect. It was taken from the bunch of flowers whence one of his former captives had been taken, and there was every chance of its belonging to the same hive as its companion. Which direction it might take, should it prove to be a bee from either of the two hives of which the positions were now known, it altogether exceeded Boden's art to tell, so he dexterously avoided committing himself. It was enough that Peter gazed attentively, and that he saw the insect dart away, disappearing in the direction of the island. By this time more of the savages were on the alert, and now knowing how and where to look for the bee, they also saw its course.

"You tell him ag'in go dere?" asked Peter, whose interest by this time was so manifest, as to defy all attempts at concealment.

"To be sure I did. The bees obey me, as your young men obey you. I am their chief, and they know me. I will give you further proof of this. We will now go to that little bit of wood, when you shall all see what it contains. I have sent three of my bees there; and here, one of them is already back, to let me know what he has seen."

Sure enough, a bee was buzzing around the head of le Bourdon, probably attracted by some fragment of comb, and he cunningly converted it into a messenger from the copse! All this was wonderful to the crowd, and it even greatly troubled Peter. This man was much less liable to the influence of superstition than most of his people; but he was very far from being altogether above it. This is the fact with very few civilized men; perhaps with no man whatever, let his philosophy and knowledge be what they may; and least of all, is it true with the ignorant. There is too much of the uncertain, of the conjectural in our condition as human beings, to raise us altogether above the distrusts, doubts, wonder, and other weaknesses of our present condition. To these simple savages, the manner in which the bees flew, seemingly at le Bourdon's bidding, to this or that thicket, was quite as much a matter of astonishment, as any of our most elaborate deceptions are wonders to our own ignorant and vulgar. Ignorant! And where is the line to be drawn that is to place men beyond the pale of ignorance? Each of us fails in some one, if not in very many of the important branches of the knowledge that is even reduced to rules Among us. Here is seen the man of books, so ignorant of the application of his own beloved theories, as to be a mere child in practice; and there, again, can be seen the expert in practice, who is totally unacquainted with a single principle of the many that lie at the root of his very handicraft. Let us not, then, deride these poor children of the forest, because that which was so entirely new to them, should also appear inexplicable and supernatural.

As for Peter, he was