THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



29 



placing in the hive a piece of comb filled with 

 sugar syrup and water ; upon which they soon 

 worked quite freely. At sunset on the fifth 

 day of their imprisonment, I smoked them 

 again and let a few fly out. They returned 

 promptly to the hive. Next morning, I let out 

 about a dozen bees. These flew about for sev- 

 eral minutes, apparantly acquainting them- 

 selves with the " new order of things " about 

 their adopted home, and then off to the blos- 

 soms. From these, in due time, they all re- 

 turned with stores for the young. I then re- 

 moved the slide, and gave all of them the 

 "freedom of the town," which they industri- 

 ously improved. The result is an excellent 

 swarm of bees, with a young queen safely fer- 

 tilized ; and all now working finely. 



Mr. Editor, here, away down east, on the 

 south of the charming Penobscot, scientific 

 bee-keeping is yet in its infancy. Still, it is be- 

 ginning to receive more attention, and we hope 

 soon to see the branch of apiculture prosecuted 

 with the same intelligence and enterprise that 

 is given to agricultural pursuits. 



George S. SrLSBY. 



Wintersport, Me. 



[For the American Beo Journal.] 



Bees and the Echo. 



One should have imagined that echoes, if not 

 entertaining, must at least be harmless and in- 

 offensive ; yet Virgil advances a strange notion, 

 that they are injurious to bees. After enume- 

 rating some probable and reasonable annoyan- 

 ces, such as prudent owners would wish far re- 

 moved from their bee-gardens, he adds: 



" Aut ubi concava pulsa, 

 Saxa sonant, vocique offensa resultat imago." 



This" wild and fanciful assertion will hardly 

 be admitted by the philosophers of these days, 

 especially as they are all now agreed that insects 

 are not furnished with any organs of hearing at 

 all. But, if it should be urged that, though 

 they cannot hear, yet perhaps they may feel 

 the repercussion of sounds, I grant it is possible 

 they may. Yet that these impressions are dis- 

 tasteful or hurtful I deny, because bees, in good 

 summers, thrive well in my outlet, where the 

 echoes are very strong, for this village is anoth- 

 er Anathoth, a place of responses or echoes. 

 Besides, it does not appear from experiment 

 that bees are in any way capable of being affec- 

 ted by sounds ; for I have often tried my own 

 with a large speaking trumpet held close to their 

 hives, and with such an exertion of voice as 

 would have hailed a ship at the distance of a 

 mile, and still these insects pursued their 

 various employments undisturbed, and with- 

 out showing the least sensibility or resentment. 

 — Whtie's Selbome. 



Ten millions of pounds of starch sugar syrup 

 are annually manufactured in Switzerland, and 

 twelve millions of pounds in France. This 

 syrup is principally used in the breweries of the 

 former country, and in the distilleries of the lat- 

 ter. Under the name of glucose it is also used 

 in both countries by the confectioners, and as 

 a bee-feed by bee-keepers. 



Bees often fasten frames, honey-boards, and 

 boxes so firmly that it is difficult to remove 

 them. By greasing with tallow the parts likely 

 to be so fastened, they will separate readily, 

 and the gum :'s easily removed. It is best to do 

 it when the wood has not already been coated 

 with propolis, but while still new and clean. It 

 does not appear to annov the bees, and they 

 put on the usual amount of gum, but it is easily 

 removed. Ciiarles Carpenter. 



Kellev's Island, Ohio. 



Bleaching Wax. 



Wax is freed from its impurities, and bleach- 

 ed, by melting it with hot water or steam, in a 

 tinned, copper, or wooden vessel, letting it set- 

 tle, running off the supernatant oily-looking 

 liquid into an oblong trough with a line of 

 holes in its bottom, so as to distribute it upon 

 horizontal wooden cylinders, made to revolve 

 half immersed in cold water, and then exposing 

 the thin ribands or films thus obtained to the 

 bleaching action of light, air, and moisture. 

 For this purpose, the ribbands are laid upon 

 long webs of canvas stretched horizontally be- 

 tween standards, two feet above the surface of 

 a sheltered field, having a free exposure to the 

 sunbeams. Here they are frequently turned 

 over, then covered by nets to prevent their be- 

 ing blown away by winds, and watered from 

 time to time, like linen upon the grass field in 

 the old method of bleaching. Whenever the 

 color of the wax seems stationary, it is collected, 

 remelted, and thrown again into ribands upon 

 the wet cylinder, in order to expose new sur- 

 faces to the blanching operation. By several 

 repetions of these processes, if the weather 

 proves favorable, the wax eventually loses its 

 yellow tint entirely, and becomes fit for form- 

 ing white candles. If it be finished under rain, 

 it will become grey on keeping, and also lose 

 in weight. 



In France, where the purification of wax is a 

 considerable object of manufacture, about four 

 ounces of cream of tartar, or alum, are added 

 to the water in the first melting copper, and the 

 solution is incorporated with the wax by dili- 

 gent manipulation. The whole is left at rest 

 for sometime, and then the supernatant wax is 

 run off into a settling cistern, whence it is dis- 

 charged by a stopcock or tap, over the w T ooden 

 cylinder revolving at the surface of a large 

 water-cistern., kept cool by passing a stream 

 continually through it. 



The bleached wax is finally melted, strained 

 through silk sieves, and then run into circular 

 cavities in a moistened table, to be « ust or 

 moulded into thin disc pieces, weighing from 

 two to three ounces each, and three or four 

 inches in diameter. 



Neither chlorine, nor even the chlorides of 

 lime and alkalies, can be employed with any 

 advantage to bleach wax, because they render 

 it brittle, and impair its burning quality. 



Wax purified as above, is white and translu- 

 cent in thin segments, and has neither taste nor 

 9mell. — Ure. 



