142 THE BEE-HIVES. 



Apiarists, shows that these hives have some advantages, the 

 greatest objection to them being the difficulty of fitting the 

 frames together, after inspection, without crushing some bees, 

 unless they have been previously shaken out. 



286. Several attempts were made, in the first half of the 

 nineteenth century, to invent a practical hanging-frame hive; 

 that is, a hive in which each comb, hanging in a separate 

 frame, could be readily taken out and replaced without jarring 

 the hive, or removing the other frames. Propokovitsch, in 

 Russia, Munn, in England, Debeauvoys, in France, tried and 

 failed. At last, in October, 1851, Mr. Langstroth invented the 

 top-openmg movable-frame hive, now used the world over 

 Avith slight variations, in which the combs are attached to 

 movable frames so suspended in the hives as to touch neither 

 the top, bottom, nor sides; leaving, between the frames and 

 the hive walls, a space of from one-fourth to three-eighths of 

 an inch, called bee-space. (Fig. 59.) 



287. By this device the combs can be removed at pleas- 

 ure, without any cutting, and speedily transferred to another 

 hive. Our congenial friend. Prof. A. J. Cook, author of "The 

 Bee-keepei*'s Guide," says of it : "It is this hive, the greatest 

 apiarian invention ever made, that has placed American 

 Apiculture in advance of that of all other countries." And 

 no one knows, better than the revisers of this work, that such 

 is the plain truth, as they have watched the progress of 

 bee-keeping in Europe, through its French. Italian, Swiss, 

 and German bee-papers, for forty years past. 



288. Mr. Langstroth, however, modestly disclaimed the 

 idea of having attained perfection in his hive. He wrotfe: 



''Having carefully studied the nature of the honey-bee, for 

 many years, and compared my observations with those of writ- 

 ers and cultivators who have spent their lives in extending the 

 sphere of apiarian knowledge, I have endeavored to remedy the 

 many difficulties with which bee-culture is beset, by adapting 

 ray invention to the actual habits and wants of the insect. I 

 have also tested the merits of this hive by long and continued 

 experiments, made on a large scale, so that I might not. by de- 



