THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



will quickly proceed to fill them with 

 honey. By thus making use a second 

 time of the old combs the time of the bees 

 is saved; and they give to honey-making 

 preciou days of summer which would 

 otherwise be devoted to the building up 

 of fresh waxen cells. The whole process 

 which we have described lasted less than 

 an hour. 



The stationary exhibition of the asso- 

 ciation was scarcely less interesting. 

 There were some bees here, but they were 

 imprisoned closely within their glass 

 house or observatory hive. Mr. C. W. 

 Smith exhibited, and obtained a prize for, 

 the most beautiful breed of Ligurian bees 

 a queen accompanied by her progeny. 

 There are fifty diftereut kind of bees 

 known to exhibitors, but the bee of the 

 Maritime Alps which gained this prize is 

 the most highly valued of all for its fine 

 appearance, good temper, and reproduc- 

 tiveness. It is the "yellow-banded bee," 

 of Tennyson, and is used to improve the 

 strain of the common black bee. There 

 are also exhibited here, the detatched 

 glass frames following each other like the 

 leaves of a book, the frame hives as orig- 

 inally constructed by Francis Huber. 

 The blind naturalist flourished at Geneva 

 in the last century, and all his experi- 

 ments were made with the eyes and hands 

 of his assistant, Burnens, guided by the 

 master's judgment. The frame is the 

 key-stone of modern hive-buildiug. The 

 whole show is the development of the 

 discovery of Iluber. In the modern 

 hives, bars of wood are laid across the 

 top of a box, little slits are made in the 

 lower side of the bars. In these slits wax 

 is inserted. When the bees are admitted 

 they find the wax, attach their combs to 

 it, and these are thenceforth formed in 

 straight lines, and are thus more conven- 

 ient for the use and observation of man 

 than the spoke-like and irregular arrange- 

 ments which otherwise are made by the 

 insects. Mr. F. Cheshire took the prize 

 for the best hive frame with moveable 

 combs. For the best cottager's hive on 

 the modern principle the prize was 

 awarded to the untiring Mr. Abbott's 3s. 

 hive. Mr. J. Lee gained another prize in 

 this class for a tall and handsome house 

 of three stories, each story forming a 

 super to the stock hive, or a new stock 

 hive. There were in these classes innu- 

 merable ingenious combinations of detail 

 and whimsical varieties of pattern. The 

 bars are kept apart by pins in some 

 hives, by notches in others. Some hives 

 are made to imitate houses, others are 

 like iron safes. One is a humble imita- 

 tion of the great Palace of human indus- 

 try and amusement in which it is exhibited. 



The "run" honey which was shewn, 

 varied in colour from the purest shade of 

 primrose yellow to the darkest brown. 

 It is well known that the hue depends 

 upon the food of the bee, white clover 

 producing a comb as white as snow, and 

 primrose honey, while hives which stand 

 near the sycamore will give a fluid as 

 dark as punch. Mr. A. Ferguson, whose • 

 bees feed probably upon the clover fields 

 of Ayr, the Hon. and Rev. H. Bligh, of 

 Ilenley-on-Thames, and Mr. Abbott tied 

 for the largest and best harvest of one 

 stock of bees. The Rev. G. Raynor had 

 the best exhibition of super honey from 

 one apiary. The w^eight is not declared, 

 but Mr. W.B.Carr competed in this class 

 with a gross weight declared by him to 

 be about lUO lb. Mrs. W. H. Clark ex- 

 hibited the best straw super, probably 

 about 40 lb. In a similar class the prize 

 was taken by Mrs. Pagden, widow of the 

 Sussex bee-master, who has told how he 

 made £70 a year by his bees. In similar 

 classes the name occurs of Mr. Cowan, 

 who recently informed us that he had 700 

 K) of honey in the season from twelve 

 stocks of bees; and we are struck with the 

 frequent replition of the name of Ander- 

 son, an Ayrshire family, one of whom 

 came up from the neighbourhood of 

 Stewarton, of honeyed fame, with thirty- 

 four specimens of his own and neigh- 

 bours' growth, and lost not one super by 

 breakage or otherwise in all that journey. 

 In the cottagers' classes, open only to 

 those who work for daily hire, there w^ere 

 twenty-two entries, and Mr. Withnal, Mr. 

 Ferguson, and Mr. W. Martin were the 

 most successful exhibitors. Mr. Cheshire 

 obtained extra prizes for several ingenious 

 inventions. With five pins he formed a 

 little trap for keeping bees out of a hive 

 where they are no longer wanted. The 

 pin bisects the little hole left for egress, 

 making a valve which may be lifted on 

 going out but bars all return. There is a 

 drone trap of dift'erent construction. 

 Another invention is a nucleus hive. 

 Where a queen is desired for adding to 

 the stock, Mr. Cheshire puts in the hive a 

 bar which can double up. W^hen brood 

 cells are attached to the bar he takes it 

 out, and puts it into the nucleus hive. 

 The bees transferred find themselves 

 without a queen, and set to work to feed 

 and house one of the young in such a way 

 that it develops into a (lueen fit to fly 

 abroad and become the mother of many 

 bees. 



Complete sets of back vohmies are scarce. 

 But few can be procured at any price. We 

 have a sc^t, consisting of the nine volumes 

 (complete), which we offer for sale, either 

 bound or unbound, for a reasonable sum. 



