NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY OP GLASGOW. 15 



and expense, to procure Queen Bees ! He remained in London a 

 few days, to allow the bees he had brought with him to get a cleansing 

 flight before shipping them for New York. His charge for a Cyprian 

 Queen bee was 30/, and for one from the Holy Land, £3 3/. I 

 wrote for two, which however only arrived last month, but they are 

 doing very well and I hope to be able to show a pure swarm in my 

 observatory hive next season. 



Our great swarming month, June, was well advanced before 

 swarming commenced, owing to the extreme cold at its beginning ; 

 but towards the end bee-keepers had their reward, and swarming set 

 in all over the country. 



Bees continued to swarm till nearly the end of July, in some 

 cases three and even four times, showing how quickly Nature 

 reproduces herself, as but a few months before 60 per cent, of the 

 entire bees in the country had perished through the neglect, or, 

 what is perhaps worse, the ignorance of their owners. Towards the 

 end of the month, being in London, I visited the British Beekeepers' 

 Show, which certainly has made great advances during the last three 

 years. There were several observatory hives that contained bees 

 from Cyprian queens. Their colour is lighter than Ligurians and 

 they are said to be more active in flight. Bee furniture was there 

 in endless variety, and both flower and clover honey as nearly perfect 

 as could be. Certainly both visitors and exhibitors got their eyes 

 opened to what is really wanted by the public. Could we in Scot- 

 land only be able to arouse the clergy and influence country pro- 

 prietors, there would certainly be a great future for honey producers. 



Swarming over, the bees began to enter their supers and gladden 

 the hearts of their proprietors. Until August, in Argyllshire, not a 

 super had been entered. Towards the end of the month, noticing 

 that not a single stock of Ligurians had entered their supers, I at 

 once examined, and, alas ! on opening the first one discovered that 

 awful curse of bee-keepers, " foul brood," to be rampant. On hearing 

 this, my man, who is rather a character, said, " I never liked thae 

 foreign gentry. Gie me the blacks and ye can work awa' with thae 

 robbers, and we'll see wha gets the best boxes," meaning the supers. 

 Strange to say, the whole four Ligurian hives were the same, while 

 the black bees had entirely escaped. In searching for the cause of 

 this I traced it back to the month of May, when my Ligurian stocks 

 were stealing my neighbour's honey, especially from two stocks which 

 had died and ought to have been removed by their careless owner. 



