Actions and Reactions

A passage from the book... It came without warning, at the very hour his hand was outstretched to crumple the Holz and Gunsberg Combine. The New York doctors called it overwork, and he lay in a darkened room If the stock had not been old and overcrowded, the Wax-moth would never have entered; but where bees are too thick on the comb there must be sickness or parasites. The heat of the hive had risen with the June honey-flow, and though the farmers worked, until their wings ached, to keep people cool, everybody suffered. A young bee crawled up the greasy trampled alighting-board. "Excuse me," she began, "but it's my first honey-flight. Could you kindly tell me if this is my--" "--own hive?" the Guard snapped. "Yes! Buzz in, and be foul-brooded to you! Next!" "Shame!" cried half a dozen old workers with worn wings and nerves, and there was a scuffle and a hum.