Last Sunday Cousin Madeline and friend Doug came to lunch. Madeline is a horticulturalist and Editor of the Ashdown Forest magazine and regarded in the family as an authority on gardening and wild life. I, alas, am no fan of creepy-crawlies. Once in Sri Lanka having reluctantly shared my shower with a cockroach I was chased in from the garden by a hornet only to find a 12 inch lizard in the kitchen. I chased it out with a newspaper , flapping at it like thge old parlour game of Flip the Kipper. These days I think snow and wild life are best viewed through a window. As Kathy Lette says the great outdoors is that bit between the back seat of a taxi and the front door of Selfridges. But I digress.
To get back to Sunday. We five sat in the conservatory in the warm spring sunshine with the door ajar when a large bumble bee came blundering in. It buzzed loudly against the glass trying desperately to find a way out. Suddenly its tone changed almost to a shriek. Consternation!! It was caught high up in a spider’s web. Amanda prevailed upon Mike to rescue it with the aid of a long-handled dusting brush. He put it on a low wall just outside. Madeline told Amanda to get a small amount of honey and water and put it beside the bee. Then Madeline took two twigs and patiently unwound the sticky strands of spider’s web from the poor bee. It reached out for the honey and was last seen walking along the terrace, then disappeared. Such excitement on a quiet Sunday afternoon!
