804 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



nated to utility. But the more advanced scientific bee-keeping of to- 

 day may, without assuming much license or latitude, be called " one 

 of the fine arts." To the cultured and aesthetic devotee of art proper 

 in the recesses of his studio, who has never practically studied the 

 nature and habits of the wonderful little honey-bee, and manipulated 

 it from day to day, this claim for our beloved art may excite a smile. 

 Nevertheless, the apiarian devotee who has studied, observed, and 

 handled the marvelous denizens of his hives for twenty years will 

 affirm his art, no less than the flavor of the nectar it produces, to be 

 ixidLcedi fine. Ladies of high culture and refined tastes are engaged 

 (and successfully too) in bee-culture with all the enthusiasm which is 

 naturally inspired by a congenial and ennobling pursuit ; and this is 

 the best proof of our contention as to its aesthetic status. Being 

 withal a healthful occupation, bee-culture invitingly offers itself to 

 those in delicate health and not strong enough for hard jshysical labor. 

 In numerous instances such persons, by engaging in this pursuit, have 

 not only procured liberal means of subsistence, but have also recovered 

 lost health and strength. The capital required is comparatively small, 

 while the average return for skilled exertion is large. Hardly any 

 other legitimate business yields so large a return in dollars and cents 

 for the amount invested and the work bestowed. True, bee-keeping 

 has its formidable obstacles and serious drawbacks ; but these, while 

 sometimes troublesome to the scientific apiarist, are disastrous mostly 

 to the unskillful or negligent, or the mere neophyte. And even though 

 the cargo of industry sink, not much treasure in money or labor is car- 

 ried to the bottom, while a very little capital added to the valuable 

 lesson of failure soon sets the redoubtable amateur on his legs again. 



The honey-bee — which belongs to the general branch of the animal 

 kingdom called Articulates, and to the class Insecta, and to the sub- 

 class Hexapoda, and to the order Hymenoptera, and the family Apidce, 

 and genus Apis, and species Apis melUfica — is one of the most intense- 

 ly interesting studies in the whole domain of natural history. When 

 the immortal Darwin had the scientific zeal and patience to study the 

 apparently insignificant earth-worm for forty long years, leaving a 

 field untouched for thirty years for the purpose of studying and ob- 

 serving the habits of these despised creatures, how comparatively easy 

 and pleasant to study the honey-bee, which is so much more useful and 

 beautiful ! The fact that the honey-bee is so much more serviceable to 

 man than many others of the lower creatures whose nature and habits 

 are equally wonderful, as the ant, for instance, invests it with a double 

 interest to us. Insects which are pests, no matter how marvelous in 

 structure and habit, we can not study with that intense pleasure and 

 interest we can those that yield so much to our physical as well as 

 mental gratification. 



Of the species Apis mellifica there are many varieties — the princi- 

 pal of which are the Ligurian or Italian bee ; the German or black 



