208 FIFTY YEARS AMONG THE BEES 



level floor on which to put the supers, so strips of thin 

 board or lath are laid so the supers will be level. The 

 size of the wagon-box is such as to take on one side three 

 supers running crosswise, and on the other side two 

 supers running fore and aft. Great care is taken to 

 build up the piles true, and when all are on they are 

 fastened together by laths with nails driven partly in, so 

 the nails can easily be drawn upon reaching home. Each 

 pile has a lath vertically, across the top laths are braced 

 in both directions, so that the whole load is practically 

 one solid pile (Fig. 64). As the load comes mainly on 

 the hind axle, 40 supers are as many as we like to haul 

 at one load. We seldom take so large a load. 



As I have said, putting the load on the wagon at the 

 close of the season is something of a ticklish job, and is 

 mostly done under cover of smoke, my assistant playing 

 the smoker wherever it will do the most good. The 

 character of the tent-escape comes into fine play here, for 

 it can so quickly and surely be thrown into the right 

 place that the robber-bees have little chance at the piles, 

 so the smoking is mostly done at the wagon. A robber- 

 cloth (Fig. 75) is even a little better than the tent 

 escape. 



When the load is all on, the wagon is drawn away to 

 a distance safe for the horses. This may be 8 or 10 rods, 

 or it may be more than twice that distance. Fortunately, 

 at each out-apiary the ground lies in such a way that 

 after the first few rods the ground is descending, making 

 is easy to draw the load the longer distance. Then the 

 horses are hitched on as speedily as possible. 



HONEY-ROOM. 



Generally. Philo will be ready to take oflf the load 

 when we get home, unless we get home too near bed- 

 time and Philo has gone home, in which case I am not 

 plways a good enough fighter to keep the women from 

 helping to carry the supers into the honey-room. This 



