116 MAY. 



charms them down. They alight, or rather the 

 queen-bee alights, upon the end of a bough, 

 and the rest of the bees clustering, or as it is 

 termed knitting, about her, form a living, brown, 

 dependent cone. Beneath this some adroit 

 operator spreads a cloth (upon a table if one 

 can be had) and holding an empty hive in- 

 verted under the swarm, suddenly shakes them 

 into it, and places it, with all the captive colony 

 in it, upon the cloth. In this state they are 

 conveyed to the place they are intended to 

 occupy, and the following morning they are 

 found to have taken kindly to their new dwell- 

 ing. They will frequently fix themselves in the 

 roofs of houses. 



It is a superstition common both in France 

 and in this country, to announce to the bees 

 the death of the master of the family ; in some 

 places, of any individual of the family, or it is 

 believed, the bees would die, or fly away. It 

 is also reckoned unlucky to sell bees, in some 

 places, and for this reason when a person parts 

 with a hive, he will not receive its value in 

 money, but stipulates for a certain part of its 

 produce. 



RURAL OCCUPATIONS. 



Cattle are turned out to pasture as soon as 

 there is a sufficiency of grass, which is not till 



