The
bees flew around them, and seemed to know them. The little Princess,
lying in her basket, crowed and laughed, and caught at them when they
came humming over her face. Her nurses stood around her, and waved
great fans of peacock-feathers, but that did not frighten the bees at
all.
The court's lunch was spread on a damask-cloth, in an open space
between the trees. There were biscuits of wheaten flour, plates of
honey-comb, and cream in tall glass ewers. That was the regulation
lunch at the Bee Festival. The Bee Festival was nearly as old as the
kingdom, and there was an ancient legend about it, which the Poet
Laureate had put into an epic poem. The King had it in his royal
library, printed in golden letters and bound in old gold plush.
Centuries ago, so the legend ran, in the days of the very first
monarch of the royal family of which this king was a member, there
were no bees at all in the kingdom. Not a child in the whole country,
not even the little princes and princesses in the palace, had ever
tasted a bit of bread and honey.
But, while there were no bees in this kingdom, one just across the
river was swarming with them. That kingdom was governed by a king who
was the tenth cousin of the first, and not very well disposed toward
him. He had stationed lines of sentinels with ostrich-feather brooms
on his bank of the river to keep the bees from flying over, and he
would not export a single bee, nor one ounce of honey, although he had
been offered immense sums.
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