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traced, however, the identity of my " bar-frame hive" only 

 in a very early " frame maker," viz., Samson, who, doubt- 

 less, must have taken the honey ft-oni the carcase (dried in 

 the eastern climate, and perhaps showing its ribs), which 

 would at once suggest the bars of a hive, although it would 

 be difficult to prove that Samson took ribs and all with the 

 comb to give to his father and mother, and afterwards gave 

 the Philistines that puzzling riddle, " Out of the eater came 

 forth meat," and in the same manner it seems necessary 

 that the " bar-frame hive " should be explained to some of 

 those learned editors of bee books and bee articles in publi- 

 cations ; or they may give the credit to the Americans and 

 Germans. I therefore challenge these gentlemen to pro- 

 duce any book or pamphlet in which a " bar and frame " 

 has been mentioned as having been used before the publica- 

 tion of my pamphlet and the introduction of my patent in 

 Paris. Mr. John Milton (not the poet), Marylebone-street, 

 first noticed this bar-frame hive in 1843. The advantages of 

 the "patent bar and frame hive" consist in affording per- 

 fect protection from wet in the open air, retaining an equal 

 temperature within the hive, both in summer and winter. 

 The bees can be fed without exposure to the cold from 

 above. It also provides cool store room for the honey, per- 

 fect inspection of the whole hive at any moment, an easy 

 method of taking the honey without destroying the bees, 

 &c., &c. I believe I gave Mr. Pettitt this invention at the 

 Royal Agricultural Association meeting, in 1851, or before, 

 and in 1860 the Agricultural magazine reporting on the 

 various hives exhibited by Mr. Pettitt, adds the " bar-frame 

 hive " is fitted up with a mathematical correctness, that 

 every comb is constructed in a bar-frame, by which each 

 can be viewed by the use of an observation frame, made with 

 glass sides, and every comb can be brought to view in per- 

 fect safety, each one, as it were, worked on a hinge, and 

 when lifted into the observation frame can be taken away 

 without a single bee escaping ; and the queen bee ea.sily 

 ■"emoved into the drawing-room for observation, and again 



