AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



301 



away from it. But I could never notice 

 that a bee flew away when I made 

 motions with my fingers as though I 

 would catch it. 



But the thing in which animals are 

 deficient is, as Johann Muller remarks, 

 the faculty of forming conceptions. The 

 bee is incapable of forming the idea of 

 several ideas, of forming generalizations; 

 it cannot form the conception of honey, 

 it cannot, therefore, form a general idea; 

 it cannot form the idea that honey is 

 sweet ; it does not apprehend the connec- 

 tion which exists between honey and 

 sweet. 



Because the essential connection be- 

 tween things escapes animals, their 

 minds may harbor a world of individual 

 ideas, but they cannot find the stationary 

 pole in the series of phenomena, on that 

 account are they so limited. If one of 

 the higher animals has accidentally 

 done something whereby advantage has 

 been gained, it repeats this. 



My magpie continually threw about 

 some yellow, blue and red paper, which 

 I had laid at the bottom of its cage. I 

 several times concealed a bit of meat 

 under the blue paper ; when it threw 

 about the blue paper again, it found the 

 meat and ate it up eagerly. After it had 

 found meat under the blue paper several 

 times, and I again laid papers in the 

 cage it only attended to the blue. Simi- 

 larly I accustomed it to draw a piece of 

 meat, which hung by a thread under 

 the cage. But to form conclusions from 

 the analysis of conceptions, to deduce 

 actions that would be useful to it, of 

 this it was just as incapable as any other 

 animal. But there do occur acts of ani- 

 mals which do not depend on experience. 



In these acts of instinct our bee stands 

 higher than any other animal ; it is the 

 proper representative of instinct. Its 

 remarkable household, with its labor, its 

 comb construction — wonderful on ac- 

 count of the skill manifested, more, won- 

 derful because of the mathematical prob- 

 lem that is solved in it — have been from 

 of old the admiration of men. I have 

 been close to swallows and seen them 

 build. I have seen the more remarkable 

 web woven by spiders, but the thing 

 that has charmed me most is the leger- 

 demain-like skill with which a bee takes 

 out a scale of wax from between the 

 abdominal rings, and with which it 

 attaches the. particles when duly 

 kneaded. 



Who has not been touched by the mar- 

 velous nature-rule which impels a bee to 

 make way for her queen, when she walks 

 over the comb to lay her eggs ? The 

 man who can stand before the mysteri- 



ous powers which hand to one another 

 here their golden flagons, without being 

 inspired by a feeling— I might say a 

 sacred feeling— of reverence, must be a 

 Philistine. 



Bee-Keening in Central Missonri, 



C. L. BUCKMASTEE. 



Last year I had three colonies of black 

 and hybrid bees (which cost me $7.50), 

 and they increased to six, but one colony 

 had no queen, and they died before 

 Winter. These were in different kinds of 

 hives, so I could do nothing to help them. 

 Four came through the Winter all right, 

 and the other one had the fewest number 

 of bees — if I should say a handful I am 



sure I would say too many. I have made 

 a good colony of. this small affair by 

 giving them two frames of brood. 



This Spring I bought 16 colonies, in 

 box-hives, for $1 each, and 1 colony was 

 given to me, making 22 colonies alto- 

 gether. I transferred them to 8-f rame 

 Langstroth hives, and used the old boxes 

 for wood. This was a big job, and I 

 think prevented the bees from swarming, 

 for I had only a few swarms. I now 

 have 28 colonies in good condition, and 

 have taken about 300 pounds of extract- 

 ed-honey, and I think I can take 200 

 pounds more in a few days. I would 

 have a nice lot of comb-honey if my 

 supers had not been delayed so long. I 

 have made 50 hives and the furniture 

 for them, and did all the transferring 

 myself. 



I now have the whole theory of bee- 

 keeping, and have had some of the prac- 

 tice. I have learned that bees need no 

 cellar in this climate ; that black bees 

 store honey in the sections much the 

 prettiest, but the honey will not sell for 

 any more than that stored by the Italians. 



I am going to Italianize some colonies 

 this Fall, and the remainder next Spring. 

 I am making artificial swarms with 

 frames of brood and young bees, to put 

 my new Italian queens with. If I do not 



