said Fridolin, a little envious, "you
with your sting are safe. A person'll think twice before he'll
let you sting his tongue. Anybody'll tell you that. But how
about us bark-beetles? How do you think we feel? A cousin of
mine got caught. We had just had a little quarrel on account
of my wife. I remember every detail perfectly. My cousin was
paying us a visit and hadn't yet got used to our ways or our
arrangements. All of a sudden we heard a woodpecker scratching
and boring--one of the smaller species. It must have begun
right at our building because as a rule we hear him beforehand
and have time to run to shelter before he reaches us.

"Suddenly I heard my poor cousin scream in the dark: 'Fridolin,
I'm sticking!' Then all I heard was a short desperate scuffle,
followed by complete silence, and in a few moments the woodpecker
was hammering at the house next door. My poor cousin! Her name
was Agatha."

"Feel how my heart is beating," said Maya, in a whisper.
"You oughtn't to have told it so quickly. My goodness, the
things that do happen!" And the little bee thought of her own
adventures in the past and the accidents that might still happen
to her.

A laugh from Fridolin interrupted her reflections. She looked up
in surprise.

"See who's coming," he cried, "coming up the tree. Here's the
fellow for you! I tell you, he's a--but you'll see."

Maya followed the direction of his gaze and saw a remarkable
animal slowly climbing up the trunk. She wouldn't have believed
such a creature was possible if she had not seen it with her own
eyes.

"Hadn't we better hide?" she asked, alarm getting the better of
astonishment.

"Absurd," replied the bark-beetle, "just sit still and be polite
to the gentleman. He is very learned, really, very scholarly,
and what is more, kind and modest and, like most persons of his
type, rather funny. See what he's doing now!"

"Probably thinking," observed Maya, who couldn't get over her
astonishment.

"He's struggling against the wind," said Fridolin, and laughed.
"I hope his legs don't get entangled."

"Are those long threads really his legs?" asked Maya, opening
her eyes wide. "I've never seen the like."

Meanwhile the newcomer had drawn near, and Maya got a better
view of him. He looked as though he were swinging in the air,
his rotund little body hung so high on his monstrously long
legs, which groped for a footing on all sides like a movable
scaffolding of threads. He stepped al