1882-83-] EdiiiburgJi Naturalists Field Club. 71 



affectionate entreaties, begging her with all earnestness in my power to stand 

 her ground, and keep her present posture ; in order to which I gave her en- 

 couragement to hope for a full discharge from her disagreeable companions. 

 I began to search amongst them for the queen, they ha\dng now got in a 

 great body upon her breast, about her neck, and up to her chin. I immedi- 

 ately seized her from the crowd, with some of the commons in company with 

 her, and put them together into the hive. Here I watched her for some time, 

 and as I did not observe that she came out, I conceived an expectation of see- 

 ing the whole body quickly abandon their settlement : but instead of that, I 

 soon observed them gathering closer together, without the least signal of de- 

 parting. Then I immediately reflected that either there must be another 

 sovereign, or that the same was returned. I directly commenced a second 

 search, and in a short time, with a most agreeable surprise, found a second or 

 the same. She strove by entering farther into the crowd to escape me, but I 

 reconducted her with a great number of the populace into the hive. And 

 now the melancholy scene began to change into one infinitely more agreeable 

 and pleasant. The Bees, missing their queen, began to dislodge and rapair 

 to the hive, crowding into it in multitudes, and in the greatest hurry imagin- 

 able, and in the space of two or three minutes the maid had not a single Bee 

 about her, neither had she so much as one sting." 



Artificial swarms are now frequently made either by driving- from 

 straw skeps, or where frame-hives are used, by taking a few frames 

 containing brood-comb from a full hive, and putting them into an 

 empty one. These processes are fully explained in the cheap leaf- 

 lets published by the British Bee-Keeper's Association. The titles 

 of the leaflets published at a halfpenny each are as under, and they 

 are most useful publications : " Making an Apiary," " Managing 

 an Apiary," " Quieting Bees," " Bee Entomology," " Transferring," 

 " Feeding," " Ligurianising," " Driving Bees," " Making Artificial 

 Swarms," and " Fixing Comb Foundations." 



Some years ago I assisted my friend Mr Lowe to drive a stock of 

 Bees : it was a Liginian colony which he wished to send to London. 

 The process is simple. We reversed the straw hive, placed an empty 

 hive on the top, put a cloth round the junction of the two hives, 

 then drummed on the inverted hive to alarm the Bees, which hur- 

 ried with their queen up into the empty hive, where they clustered. 

 This we did in the evening, and the same night the Bees in the 

 new hive were despatched to London, and the old hive, full of brood 

 and a few workers, restored to its former place. 



The practice of ligurianising stocks of black Bees is now carried 

 on extensively — /.e., substituting a Ligurian queen for a black one. 

 These queens are bred here, and also imported for sale at 6s. or 8s. 

 each. The old queen is removed, and the Ligurian, with a few of 

 her subjects, confined in a perforated zinc cage placed in the hive. 

 It would not do to put the new queen in without this precaution, 

 as she would probably be at once destroyed. But when the workers 

 miss their queen, and the scent from the hive has penetrated well 

 into the cage, the workers, on the cage being opened, welcome the 

 new queen, and treat her as they would their own. She then be- 



