The Bee; The Beet; The Beetle

Robert Williams Wood (1868–1955) · How to Tell the Birds from the Flowers and Other Woodcuts · 1917

Good Mr. Darwin once contended
That Beetles were from Bees descended,
And as my pictures show I think
The Beet must be the missing link.
The sugar‑beet and honey‑bee
Supply the Beetle’s pedigree:
The family is now complete⁠—
The Bee, the Beetle and the Beet.

Where this text comes from

First published in How to Tell the Birds from the Flowers and Other Woodcuts (1917). First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established. [1]

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Taken from Standard Ebooks, standardebooks/robert-williams-wood_how-to-tell-the-birds-from-the-flowers-and-other-woodcuts, how-to-tell-the-birds-from-the-flowers.xhtml. Rights: public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931).

Earlier sources (3)

This poem as JSON or plain text. Line anchors #L1–#L8.

Cite this poem

Robert Williams Wood (1868–1955). “The Bee; The Beet; The Beetle.” First published in How to Tell the Birds from the Flowers and Other Woodcuts (1917). Text: Poem Index, https://poemindex.org/robert-williams-wood/the-bee-the-beet-the-beetle/. Append #L14 to cite line 14, or #L4-L9 for lines 4–9.

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