The Honey-Makers

Half natural history, half literature: how the honey-bee actually works — tongue, wings, sting, swarm — and then three thousand years of what people have believed about her, from the Vedas to mead.

The Sting

7 pages in this part of The Honey-Makers.

The Sting

THE ancients were as familiar with the stings of bees from a practical point of view as we are, but they were more concerned in discovering…

The Sting: Sometimes

Sometimes the bees fell upon people on their own account instead of taking part in human warfare, and Menzel tells us that whole cities…

The Sting: Park

During his travels in Africa Mungo Park in May, 1805, came near being wholly undone by the bees which the people of his guide Isaaco had…

The Sting: Bee-poison

Bee-poison expresses the concentrated anger of the bee, and to that is generally added more or less anger of our own, which probably…

The Sting: Butler

Bees show a diabolical aptitude for selecting sensitive parts, and Butler says: - "When they are angry, their aim is most commonly at the…

The Sting: Bees

Bees appear to be ever conscious of their stings. They never forget to use them, no matter how frightened they are or how suddenly attacked.

The Sting: Thorley

Thorley tells an affecting tale of a man who undertook to remove a swarm of bees from a tree.

Rights & ReuseThe complete text of The Honey-Makers (1899) is in the public domain in the United States — like all works published before 1928 — and is free to read, download, quote, teach from, and reuse. This digital edition (its transcription, restored images, and site design) is © 2026 PhotoOpAI, and any editorial commentary we add is clearly marked as ours; the underlying public-domain text carries no such restriction.