The tools of Ben Buzz, as Gershom had termed these implements of his trade, were neither very numerous nor very complex.  They were all contained in a small covered wooden pail like those that artisans and laborers are accustomed to carry for the purpose of conveying their food from place to place.  Uncovering this, le Bourdon had brought his implements to view, previously to the moment when he was first seen by the reader.  There was a small covered cup of tin; a wooden box; a sort of plate, or platter, made also of wood; and a common tumbler, of a very inferior, greenish glass.  In the year 1812, there was not a pane, nor a vessel, of clear, transparent glass, made in all America!  Now, some of the most beautiful manufactures of that sort, known to civilization, are abundantly produced among us, in common with a thousand other articles that are used in domestic economy.  The tumbler of Ben Buzz, however, was his countryman in more senses than one.  It was not only American, but it came from the part of Pennsylvania of which he was himself a native.  Blurred, and of a greenish hue, the glass was the best that Pittsburg could then fabricate, and Ben had bought it only the year before, on the very spot where it had been made.

An oak, of more size than usual, had stood a little remote from its fellows, or more within the open ground of the glade than the rest of the “orchard.”  Lightning had struck this tree that very summer, twisting off its trunk at a height of about four feet from the ground.  Several fragments of the body and branches lay near, and on these the spectators now took their seats, watching attentively the movements of the bee-hunter.  Of the stump Ben had made a sort of table, first levelling its splinters with an axe, and on it he placed the several implements of his craft, as he had need of each in succession.

The wooden platter was first placed on this rude table.  Then le Bourdon opened his small box, and took out of it a piece of honeycomb, that was circular in shape, and about an inch and a half in diameter.  The little covered tin vessel was next brought into use.  Some pure and beautifully clear honey was poured from its spout into the cells of the piece of comb, until each of them was about half filled.  The tumbler was next taken in hand, carefully wiped, and examined, by holding it up before the eyes of the bee-hunter.  Certainly, there was little to admire in it, but it was sufficiently transparent to answer his purposes.  All he asked was to be able to look through the glass in order to see what was going on in its interior.

Having made these preliminary arrangements, Buzzing Ben—­for the sobriquet was applied to him in this form quite as often as in the other—­next turned his attention to the velvet-like covering of the grassy glade.  Fire had run over the whole region late that spring, and the grass was now as fresh, and sweet and short, as if the place were pastured.  The white clover, in particular, abounded, and was