“He is more likely to be ringing to prevent the bees from flying away; they are probably swarming in his garden now. He is more interested in his bees and his bull than in the church.”
They were just passing the churchyard, when suddenly they heard a roaring hum, and Yanek had but just time to call out to the driver:
“Bees are coming!—Hold the horses still, or they’ll bolt.”
A huge swarm was flying with a loud drone about the church square, rising up like a sonorously purring cloud, and wheeling about in search of a good place to settle upon; at times sweeping low and floating amongst the trees. Behind it ran the priest, clad only in shirt and breeches, bareheaded, out of breath, and continually sprinkling the bees with water from an aspergill. Near him came Ambrose, creeping along in the shadow of the bushes, ringing and shouting with all his might. They went twice round the square without slackening their speed; for the bees, flying ever lower, seemed to want to alight on one of the cottages, from which the frightened children were already making their escape; but then, rising a little higher, they made straight for Yanek’s britzka. His mother, with a shriek, and pulling her petticoat over her head, ran to crouch down in the nearest ditch; the geese waddled away; the horses would have bolted, had not the driver covered their eyes with cloths. But Yanek stood quietly, with uplifted head, while the swarm swirled on above him, and passed him towards the belfry.
“Water, quick, before they are off again!” bellowed the priest, rushing after, and, coming up with them, sprinkled them with so copious a shower that their damp wings allowed them to go no farther, and they began to settle on the belfry window.
“Ambrose! the ladder and the sieve now!—Hurry, else they are away again!—Stir your leg and hurry up!—How do you do, Yanek? Get me some live coals in a thurible: we shall have to quiet them with incense!” he cried in great excitement, incessantly sprinkling the swarm as it was settling. Before he could have said a “Hail Mary,” the ladder was there, and Ambrose tinkling, and Yanek sending up clouds of aromatic smoke as from a chimney; and meanwhile the priest climbed up and, bending over the swarm, groped amongst the bees to find their queen.
“Ha! here she is! God be praised; they will not flee any farther now!—But they are dispersing: Yanek! smoke them from beneath!” he cried, taking the bees up in his bare hands and pouring them into the big sieve, the swarm being an exceedingly large one, talking to them all the while, and not in the least afraid, although they came setting on his head and crawling over his face.
“Take heed! they are getting excited, and may sting,” he said, warning the others, as he came down, surrounded by a vast cloud that was eddying on all sides of him, and buzzing and humming. On reaching the ground, he raised up the sieve as carefully and as solemnly as though it had been a Monstrance. Yanek, swinging the thurible, accompanied him; Ambrose followed, now ringing, now sprinkling the bees. And thus they went in procession to the priest’s apiary, behind his house, where stood in a separate enclosure some scores of hives, all humming as loud as if each of them were about to swarm.
While the priest was getting his bees into their new hive, Yanek, now very tired and hungry, slipped away quietly home.
They all rejoiced exceedingly to see him, and the noise and fuss made over him cannot be described. When the first outburst was over, they made him sit down to table, bringing him all sorts of good things, enticing and pressing and teasing him to eat, till the whole house echoed to the din and bustle, all wanting to be by the lad’s side or doing something for him. In the midst of this hubbub, in dropped Gregory, the Voyt’s brother, to ask them anxiously if they had seen Roch anywhere. But they had not.
“Nowhere can I find him,” he said in distress, and, without staying to talk, went on to another cabin to seek for him. Scarcely had he left them, when the priest sent for Yanek. He lingered and delayed going as long as he could, but of course had to go at last.
His Reverence, who was sitting on the porch, embraced him like a father, and, making him sit down by his side, said with great affability:
“I am glad you have come: we shall say our breviary together.—But do ye know how many swarms of bees I have this year? Fifteen! And as vigorous as any of the old ones; some have already filled a quarter of the hive with honey. And I had more swarms; but I had told Ambrose to watch for the swarming, and he fell asleep, the blockhead! and where are the bees now?—In the woods and the forests!—And then the miller stole one from me; he did, I say! They flew on to a pear-tree of his, and he claimed them for his own, and would not hear of returning them. Sore about the bull, he is, and that’s his revenge. … The robber!—What, have you heard about Felix? … Ah! these wretches, they sting like wasps!” he broke off all at once, brushing away with his handkerchief the flies that came settling on his bald crown.
“All I know is, he’s in the citadel.”
“If that were all! … And I warned him so! … The donkey would not hearken to me; and now he’s in a pretty fix. … The old father is a loud-mouthed boor; but I’m sorry for Felix; a clever young rogue, and with his Latin at his fingers’ ends, as well as any bishop! … What is that saying? ah, ‘Touch not what’s not allowed, and keep yourself from things forbidden’ … and: ‘A docile calf thrives as though
