ONE YEAR AMONG THE BEES. 129 



entirely, in my experience. Painting the entrances of the hives with 

 different colors has been said to remedy this trouble to some extent, 

 as the bees are attracted by the different colors. 



OPENING HIVES AND HANDLING THE BEES. 



Now, my friends, right here is where we must exercise a little nerve. 

 The apiarist who is accustomed to doing this work does not need any 

 toning up of his nerves, and neither will you if you have performed 

 the job a few times. But one not accustomed to the work, and who 

 undertakes it in an ordinary way, would be likely to get into serious 

 trouble, and if you found out just the proper way of doing it by actual 

 practice alone, it would be some time before you would make a com- 

 plete success of it. While bees are frequently handled without 

 smoke, yet the oldest apiarist has his smoker always at hand, and I 

 would advise the beginner not to begin without first procuring a good 

 bee smoker. If you are armed with a good smoker, and it is properly 

 equipped for business, you can everlastingly whip any colony of bees 

 into subjection on short order. 



A great many people who do not take the trouble to post them- 

 selves on the subject of bees have very peculiar ideas about them. 

 They will tell you that Mr. Soandso can handle bees and do anything 

 he wishes with them, and the bees never sting him, but Mr. Some- 

 body cannot go in sight of them without being stung, as bees have 

 a special dislike for him, etc. Now, such ideas are handed down 

 from one generation to another, and become instilled in the minds of 

 people as actual facts, when the fact is, it is all a mistake. It is true 

 that some people will receive more stings from bees than others, but 

 the reason of this is altogether in the manner the person conducts 

 himself when about them or working with them ; so that if Mr. Some- 

 body adopts Mr. Soandso's method of handling them he will receive 

 no more stings than the latter. Bees do not know one person from 

 another. I do not believe they know the apiarist that works with 

 them every day for years from any one else, except that they get ac- 

 customed to his manner of handling, and if he is not an expert in this 

 line a stranger that is an expert can take his bees and handle them at 

 once with less stings than the owner. When a boy I was taught that 

 only persons that were endowed with supernatural power could handle 

 bees. Having inclinations in that direction myself, I was told by one 

 of these "bee tamers" that I might be slightly endowed with this 

 miraculous power, and I really thought, or at least hoped, I was. But 

 after bringing my influence to bear rather heavily on a colony of bees 

 soon after, I was nearly stung to death; hence this theory exploded 

 with me early in life. 



If we wish to handle bees successfully and without stings we must 



