30 THE HIVE AND HONEY-BEE. 



of them in their most important bearings, is essential to 

 all who would realize large profits from improved methods 

 of rearing bees. Those who will not acquire the necessary 

 information, if they keep bees at all, should manage them 

 in the old-fashioned way, which demands the smallest 

 amount of knowledge and skill. 



I am well aware how difficult it is to reason with bee- 

 keepers, who have been so often imposed upon, that they 

 have no faith in statements made by any one interested in a 

 patent hive ; or who stigmatize all knowledge which does 

 not square with their own, as mere "book knowledge" 

 unworthy the attention of practical men. 



If any such read this book, let me remind them that all 

 my assertions may be put to the test. So long as the 

 interior of a hive was to common observers a profound 

 mystery, ignorant or designing men might assert what 

 they pleased of what passed in its dark recesses ; but now, 

 when every comb can in a few moments be exposed to the 

 full light of day, the man who publishes his own conceits 

 for facts, will speedily earn the character both of a .fool 

 and an imposter. 



The Queen-Bee, as she is the common 

 mother of the whole colony, may very 

 properly be called the mother-bee. She 

 reigns most unquestionably by a divine 

 right, for every good mother ought to be a 

 queen in her own family. Her shape is 

 widely different from that of the other bees. 

 "While she is not near so bulky as a drone, her body is 

 longer ; and as it is considerably more tapering, or sugar- 

 loaf in form than that of a worker, she has a somewhat 

 wasp-like appearance. Her wings are much shorter in 

 proportion than those of the drone, or worker ; the under 

 part of her body is of a golden color, and the upper part 



