HONEY BEES OF CASHMERE. 119 



Art. XIII. — Of the Management of Bees in Cashmere.^ 



Every farmer in Cashmere has several bee-hives in his 

 house, and in some houses I have counted as many as ten. 

 A provision is made for these in building the liouse, by leaving 

 appropriate cavities in the walls, which somewhat differ in size, 

 but agree in their general form, each being cylindrical, and 

 extending quite through the wall. The tube thus formed is 

 lined by a plastering of clay mortar, about an inch in thickness, 

 and the mortar is worked up with the chaff or husk of rice, or 

 with the down of thistles, which latter is employed also for 

 clay mortar in general, being the first application of this sub- 

 stance to the use of man which I have yet witnessed. The 

 dimensions of an hive are, on an average, about fourteen inches 

 in diameter, and when closed at both ends about twenty or 

 twenty-two inches in length. That end of the cylinder nearest 

 the apartment is closed by a round platter of red pottery-ware, 

 a little convex in the middle, but with the edges made flush 

 with the wall by a luting of clay mortar ; and the other extre- 

 mity is shut by a similar dish, having a circular hole about a 

 third of an inch in diameter in its centre. It does not appear 

 that there is any particular rule for the height of these hives 

 from the ground, as they are sometimes confined to the walls of 

 the lower or basement story, generally appropriated to cattle in 

 the farm-houses of Cashmere ; at others, are inserted into 

 those of the first floor ; and are frequently seen in both situ- 

 ations in the same house, as well as in the walls of its out- 

 buildings. So little difference exists betwixt the practices 

 ordinarily pursued in Cashmere and in Europe, in respect to 

 hiving new swarms, as not to call for notice ; but that adopted 

 here for preserving the old swarm, when the honey is taken, 

 well deserves imitation by other bee-farmers. Although the 

 season for taking the honey had passed when I visited Cash- 

 mere in the beginning of November, the cottagers indulged my 

 wish of seeing the process by which this was effected, with 

 little injury to the bees, and with perfect safety to the indivi- 

 duals concerned in its management, and which was as follows : — 

 I'aving in readiness a wisp of dry rice-straw, and a small 

 quantity of burning charcoal in an earthen dish, the master of the 

 house, with a few strokes of the point of a sickle, disengaged 



■' Extracted from Moorcroft's Travels in Caslnncre, Journal of the Geogra- 

 phical Society. 



