32 FIFTY YEARS AMONG THE BEES 



IMPROVED WIXTERIXG. 



The advantage of being at home through the winter 

 was apparent, for in the next four winters the average 

 loss was only 2 per cent, while for the preceding four 

 winters it had been nine times as great. A new factor, 

 however, had come in, to which part of the change was 

 to be attributed. There was chance enough to ventilate 

 the cellar, for two chimneys ran from the ground up 

 through the house, a stove-pipe hole opening from the 

 cellar into each. But the only way to warm the cellar 

 was by keeping fire in the rooms overhead, and by open- 

 ing the inside cellar-door. One day when I came home 

 from school — I think it was in December, 18T6 — I found 

 my wife had decided to hurry up the matter of warming 

 the cellar, and had a small stove set up, and throughout 

 the winter there was fire there a good part of the time. 



FIRST SECTIOX HOXEY. 



In 1877 I gave up extracted honey, the introduction 

 of sections having made such a revolution that it seemed 

 better to go back to comb honey. The sections of that 

 day were crude compared with the finished affairs of 

 the present day. One-piece sections were then unknown, 

 four-piece sections being the only ones, and there was 

 not a remarkably accurate adjustment of the dove tailed 

 parts, so that no little force was required to put the sec- 

 tions together. When a tenon and mortise did not cor- 

 respond, pounding with a mallet would make the tenon 

 smash its way through. 



In order to fasten the foundation in the section, the 

 top piece of the section had a saw-kerf going half way 

 through the wood on the under side. The top was partly 

 split apart, the edge of the foundation inserted, then the 

 wood was straightened back to place. I was not well 

 satisfied with my success in fastening in the foundation, 

 and in 1878 wrote to A. I. Root for a better plan, describ- 

 ing minutely the plan I had been using, giving a pencil 

 sketch of the board I used on my lap, with the different 



