No, father, never. 'Nor you, Frederick ?? 'No, father, nor I.'

'I wish, Frederick, you would run into the garden and gather me a ripe plum.'

'A plum, father! What for?' 'You will see when you have brought the plum.'

O pray be quick, Frederick, said Sophia; and Frederick ran off as fast as he could.

'Here is the plum, father,' said he, returning quite out of breath, but I was in such a hurry to pluck it, that I brushed off the bloom I am afraid. Are you going to eat it?'

'No. I am sorry though that you have brushed off the bloom, because it is precisely the bloom which I want to show you. Let me look at it.'

Frederick gave the plum to his father. 'You have grasped it rather roughly, to be sure; however there is still enough left. Now look at it, my boy, and you, little Sophy do you see this very fine whitish powder that lies on the surface of the plum, where it has not been touched?"

Yes, I see it,' said Frederick; but, father, there is nothing very curious in that, I have seen that thousands of times, and SO has every body who ever ate plums. I see nothing on this plum that is not to be seen on every other plum.'

• Nor I,' said his father; but are you sure that you know what this whitish powder is ?'

What it is? it is part of the plum. it not what we call the bloom?'

Is

'It is wax,' said his father.

Wax, father, real wax? Do you mean such as the bees make ?

'It is real wax, similar in kind to that made by bees.'

'Father,' said Frederick, after a silence of some minutes, 'it is curious certainly, but not so curious as I expected. At least I should have thought it much more so if the wax had been in greater quantities, so as to look like wax at once, and not to want so much studying to find it out.'

For your comfort,' said his father, 'the wax on the tree we were speaking of a little while ago, is to be seen and known as such without much studying.'

I am glad we have got back to the tree again, said Sophia. I was afraid you had quite forgotten the poor tree. Now do, father, begin, and tell us all about it, where it grows, and who discovered it, and first of all, what is its name?

Its name is Ceroxylon andicola, or Wax-tree of the Andes.'

I am glad it has an easier name than the first, said Sophia. I should never recollect that.'

You need not try, you may call it the Wax Palm Tree. It was discovered by a great traveller named Humboldt, and it grows in the upper or higher Andes, which are always covered with snow.'

But that must be a very cold place. I did not know that palm trees ever grew in such cold places.

'No more did I till I read Humboldt's travels. In Europe trees of the palm

kind are not found higher up than a thousand feet above the level of the sea. But the wax palm of the Andes is first seen at the height of sixteen hundred feet, and more abundantly in the place mentioned, which is a quarter of a mile above the level of the sea. I think I told you that the height of the palm tree is sometimes as great as one hundred and eighty feet.' 'What a tree!' said Frederick; and is it thick in proportion?'

By no means its diameter where it is thickest, is little more than a foot; and it stands, like other palms, quite straight up. One of its roots, which are numerous, is thicker than the stem of the tree itself.' But the wax, father, when shall we come to the wax? asked Sophy.

'I am just going to speak of the wax,' said her father, smiling. The whole length of the stem is marked at certain distances by rings, where leaves have grown, and between these rings is a substance of a yellowish colour and very smooth. This is the wax.'

'Real wax, pure wax?' asked Frederick 'It is, I believe, mixed with a kind of resin. The inhabitants of the country consider it as pure wax. They boil it with about the third of the quantity of soap, and make it into tapers, which are used for various purposes.'

And what sort of leaves has this wonderful tree?

'It has leaves, but not many; not more than ten at the utmost, feathered, that is, resembling feathers in form, and they are sometimes seen eighteen feet long. They

are folded over. The upper side of them is of a beautiful green, the under is covered with a kind of white scale, which gives a bright silvery appearance to this side of the leaf.'

How beautiful it must be ! Has it no flowers?

'At the base of the leaves the flowers appear in a cluster on a number of slender stalks; these flowers produce nuts or berries about the bigness of a grape, which when ripe are of a fine violet col our. The skin has a faint sweetish taste, very agreeable to birds and squirrels. The kernel is wrapped up in a double skin; the outer of a reddish colour, veiny, thick, and easily separated from the nut. The inner skin is very thin, of a pale cinnamon colour, and sticks fast to the kernel. The kernel itself is extremely hard, and about as transparent as horn.'

Thank you, father, said Sophy, when he had ended his description; but tell us what transparent means.

'What you can see through, my dear.' But is this all that you can tell us about this curious tree?

'All at least that would interest you, or that you would understand.'

Wait one moment, father, said Sophy, I want to ask you a few more questions about palm-trees.

' And so do I,' said Frederick, · but I am afraid it will take up too much time to answer them now.'

remarks on the Bee, by a Mr. Keith of Oxford in the state of Maine, and as this useful little insect is a sight constantly before the eyes of my young readers, I will insert them in Parley's Magazine. The little busy bee' is an example of industry, neatness and skill, worthy of imitation by my young friends, who have printed books as well as the book of nature always open before them.

"A NEW BEE-HIVE. The bee possesses the united skill of the mason, the architect, the geometrician and the civilian. Many naturalists of this and other countries have devoted much time in searching out their habits, admiring their sagacity, and publishing the result of their researches. They have learned much; and there is much more yet to be learned of this wonderful insect. I have myself kept bees for thirteen or fourteen years I long since felt the necessity of preserving these little creatures from the barbarous custom of annual suffocation. For a while I tried the box hive, but found my bees unwilling to enter it, and I lost several swarms in trying to force them into it. I abandoned this kind of hive, and finished a room in my garret, dark and tight, with a communication through the outside wall of the house, to give them free passage in and out. I placed a hive of bees in this room, their entrance into the hive being on a level with this outward passage and near to it. To this room I have a door from my garret, nev

At times I stole into this apiary, and by the aid of a light viewed the progress they were making, and the splendid columns of comb they were erecting. They had the benefit of the labor of all their increase-all their progeny; there was no swarming, no colonizing from their numerous family. Give bees room and they never swarm. Whoever heard of bees swarming from a hollow tree, till the space within it was filled? After the second year of their operations, and during the coldest of the winter, while the bees all lay dormant at the centre of their nectarine pile, I took my family stores from the external layers, which always contain the whitest and purest in the storehouse, and is the only portion which can be taken without injury to the residue. For many years my table was supplied from this room with the choicest of sweets, from which many a friend has enjoyed a treat, and lingered to admire this simple contrivance for the preservation of the bee, and the storehouse so well adapted to receive the fruits of his labor."