CHAPTER VI.
_The Baron is made a prisoner of war, and sold for a slave--Keeps the Sultan's bees, which are attacked by two bears--Loses one of his bees; a silver hatchet, which he throws at the bears, rebounds and flies up to the moon; brings it back by an ingenious invention; falls to the earth on his return, and helps himself out of a pit--Extricates himself from a carriage which meets his in a narrow road, in a manner never before attempted nor practised since--The wonderful effects of the frost upon his servant's French horn._ I was not always successful.

I had the misfortune to be overpowered by numbers, to be made prisoner of war; and, what is worse, but always usual among the Turks, to be sold for a slave.

[The Baron was afterwards in great favour with the Grand Seignior, as will appear hereafter.] In that state of humiliation my daily task was not very hard and laborious, but rather singular and irksome.

It was to drive the Sultan's bees every morning to their pasture-grounds, to attend them all the day long, and against night to drive them back to their hives.

One evening I missed a bee, and soon observed that two bears had fallen upon her to tear her to pieces for the honey she carried.