[log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>One of the books by James Fenimore Cooper - I think the title was
Prairie - has a secondary character who is a young beekeeper hunting bees
in Indian country on the frontier. Perhaps not historically accurate but
this reference indicates the swarms somewhat preceded the settlers.
Hello Waldemar,
I cannot locate the reference by
James Fenimore Cooper
pertaining to bees ‘preceding the settlers'
or similar accounts thereof associated with
bees by J. F. Cooper. Please send more info,
I would like to acquire the reference.
The only 'James Fenimore Cooper
reference to bees in the frontier
that I could locate,
is an account of beelining
in a book titled:
'James Fenimore Cooper' (1913)
Author: Mary E Phillips
However, there is no mention of
honeybees ‘preceding settlers‘, or
the ‘honeybees advancement westward‘.
There is a book by Washington Irving
titled ‘Crayon papers and A tour of the prairies’
that has this description you describe,
and the quote most often referenced by writers
and historians; Eva Crane etc.
Speaking of the Westward advancement
of honeybees;
“…They have been the heralds of civilization,
steadfastly preceding it as it advanced from the
Atlantic borders…”
===Book Excerpt Start===>
A tour of the parries was by Washington Irving (1783-1859)
Crayon papers and A tour of the prairies (1900)
Irving, Washington,
CHAPTER IX.
A BEE HUNT.
“THE beautiful forest in which we were encamped abounded in bee-trees ;
that is to say, trees in the decayed trunks of which wild bees had
established their hives. It is surprising in what countless swarms the
bees have overspread the Far West, within but a moderate number of years.
The Indians consider them the harbinger of the white man, as the buffalo
is of the red man; and say that, in proportion as the bee advances, the
Indian and buffalo retire. We are always accustomed to associate the hum
of the bee-hive with the farmhouse and flower-garden, and to consider
those industrious little animals as connected with the busy haunts of man,
and I am told that the wild bee is seldom to be met with at any great
distance from the frontier. They have been the heralds of civilization,
steadfastly preceding it as it advanced from the Atlantic borders, and
some of the ancient settlers of the West pretend to give the very year
when the honey-bee first crossed the Mississippi. The Indians with
surprise found the mouldering trees of their forests suddenly teeming with
ambrosial sweets, and nothing, I am told, can exceed the greedy relish
with which they banquet for the first time upon this unbought luxury of
the wilder- At present the honey-bee swarms in myriads, in the noble
groves and forests which skirt and intersect the prairies, and extend
along the alluvial bottoms of the rivers,…”
===End===>
Best Wishes,
Joe ~ Derry, PA
http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/HistoricalHoneybeeArticles
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