Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
wonderful to see the skill with which he took advantage of the slightest irregularities of the
bark or obliquity of the stem to aid his ascent, jerking the stiff creeper a few feet higher
when he had found a firm hold for his bare foot. It almost made me giddy to look at him as
he rapidly got up—thirty, forty, fifty feet above the ground; and I kept wondering how he
could possibly mount the next few feet of straight smooth trunk. Still, however, he kept on
with as much coolness and apparent certainty as if he were going up a ladder, till he got
within ten or fifteen feet of the bees. Then he stopped a moment, and took care to swing the
torch (which hung just at his feet) a little towards these dangerous insects, so as to send up
the stream of smoke between him and them. Still going on, in a minute more he brought
himself under the limb, and, in a manner quite unintelligible to me, seeing that both hands
were occupied in supporting himself by the creeper, managed to get upon it.
By this time the bees began to be alarmed, and formed a dense buzzing swarm just over
him, but he brought the torch up closer to him, and coolly brushed away those that settled on
his arms or legs. Then stretching himself along the limb, he crept towards the nearest comb
and swung the torch just under it. The moment the smoke touched it, its colour changed in a
most curious manner from black to white, the myriads of bees that had covered it flying off
and forming a dense cloud above and around. The man then lay at full length along the limb,
and brushed off the remaining bees with his hand, and then drawing his knife cut off the
comb at one slice close to the tree, and attaching the thin cord to it, let it down to his com-
panions below. He was all this time enveloped in a crowd of angry bees, and how he bore
their stings so coolly, and went on with his work at that giddy height so deliberately, was
more than I could understand. The bees were evidently not stupified by the smoke or driven
away far by it, and it was impossible that the small stream from the torch could protect his
whole body when at work. There were three other combs on the same tree, and all were suc-
cessively taken, and furnished the whole party with a luscious feast of honey and young
bees, as well as a valuable lot of wax.
After two of the combs had been let down, the bees became rather numerous below, fly-
ing about wildly and stinging viciously. Several got about me, and I was soon stung, and had
to run away, beating them off with my net and capturing them for specimens. Several of
them followed me for at least half a mile, getting into my hair and persecuting me most per-
tinaciously, so that I was more astonished than ever at the immunity of the natives. I am in-
clined to think that slow and deliberate motion, and no attempt at escape, are perhaps the
best safeguards. A bee settling on a passive native probably behaves as it would on a tree or
other inanimate substance, which it does not attempt to sting. Still they must often suffer,
