HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 249 



tion, and have bountifully supplied materials for argument and il- 

 lustration to the poet and political economist of every age. 



The subject of apiculture has been treated by the philosophy of 

 Aristotle and the genius of Virgil and Shakespear. Aristotle, writ- 

 ing a treatise on the Generation of Bees about 350 years before 

 Christ said with the modesty and caution characteristic of wonder- 

 ful genius and the foremost scholar of his time, — "All pertaining 

 to this subject has not yet been sufficiently ascertained; but if it 

 ever should be, then we must place more confidence in our obser- 

 vations than in our reasonings. Theory, however, as far as it con- 

 forms to facts observed, is worthy of credit." 



Have we not here the inductive system of philosophy as well 

 guarded and as clearly expressed as ever it was by Lord Bacon 

 1800 years afterward? In Aristotles History of Animals, we find 

 the earliest definite discription of the honey bee. Solon in the 

 year 600 B. C. enacted a law, requiring that bee-hives in cultivated 

 fields, must be placed 300 feet apart. 



The celebrated Cicilian apiarist, Aristomachus with 58 years of 

 practical experience in beekeeping wrote a work on bees and honey 

 about 500 years B. C. but his work was lost to us. 



On the statute books of ancient nations, laws are found for the 

 protection of bees, According to the old Saxon law, the theft of a 

 swarm of bees was punished with death. 



About 300 years after Aristotle, Virgil gave the current views 

 about the habits and economy of bees, in his 4th Georgic, a poem 

 remarkable for beauty and elegance, full of interest and full of 

 errors. 



In the first century Columella a naturalist, careful and accurate 

 in his observations, wrote much that was valuable and suggestive 

 and much that is simply curious. After this nearly 2000 years 

 passed with no progress in natural history, even for 200 years af- 

 ter the revival of learning in the 15th century nothing worthy of 

 note appeared. 



About the middle of the 17th century Swammerdam a Dutch 

 entomologist wrote The Natural History of Bees; a work of price- 

 less value to natural science. 



The study and practice of anatomy was then revived and sub- 

 stantial progress began to be made in the science of zoology and 

 entomology. 



Towards the middle of the 18th century the Swedish naturalist 

 Linnaeus, "the brilliart Star of the North" published his "System 

 Naturae" and threw a flood of light on the whole subject of natural 

 history. 



About the close of the last century the great Latreille of France 

 promulgated the elective system. Since then we have had Cuvier, 

 Leach, Zierzon, Von Berlepseh, Von Siebold and Huber and 

 Schiementz and later C. V. Kiley, and Packard, Cheshire and 

 a host of earnest students. 



A great many naturalists have written works on the iioney bee, 

 its natural history and management and the literature and text- 

 books upon this subject are most respectable both with respect to 



