My Bees 139 



try, and I first gave time and thought to bee- 

 raising very much as I might to chicken-raising 

 or any other hobby of the city man who has 

 only a few hours in the country which he does 

 not devote to sleep. 



My first hive was bought when I was living 

 in the Orange Mountains of New Jersey, about 

 twenty miles from New York. It arrived by 

 express, the top of the hive covered with wire- 

 cloth, through which the bees peered rather 

 curiously but not at all viciously. The direc- 

 tions were to take off the wire-cloth as carefully 

 as possible, and put on a large wooden cover. 

 As the construction of a modern beehive is 

 radically different from that of the old-fashioned 

 straw one, I may as well say a few words about 

 it. The essential part of a modern hive con- 

 sists of a wooden box eighteen inches wide, 

 two feet long, and about fourteen inches deep. 

 This box contains from eight to ten "frames," 

 which are filled up with a sheet of comb of the 

 average thickness. These sheets of comb, 

 sometimes partly filled with honey by the 

 bees, hang side by side in the hive, and usually 

 occupy the whole of the box. It is possible to 



