BOOK IX. XIV. 5-9 



when the solstice is passed and until the rising of the 

 Dog-star, a period of about thirty days, the harvests 

 of the cornfields and the honey-combs alike are 

 gathered in. How the combs should be removed 

 will be told presently when we give instructions for 

 preparing honey. 



Now Democritus, Mago and likewise Vergil have 6 

 recorded that bees can be generated at this same 

 time of year from a slain bullock. Mago indeed also 

 asserts that the same thing may be done from the 

 bellies of oxen, but I consider it superfluous to deal 

 in more detail with this method, since I am in 

 agreement with Celsus, who very wisely says that 

 there is never such mortality among these creatures, 

 that it is necessary to procure them by this means. 

 But at this time and until the autumn equinox, the 7 

 hives ought to be opened and fumigated every tenth 

 day. This, though it annoys the swarm, is generally 

 considered to be very wholesome. Then after they 

 have been fumigated and are still heated the bees 

 ought to be cooled by sprinkling the empty parts of 

 the hives and pouring in water which is cold because 

 it is very freshly drawn : then when there is any- 

 thing which cannot be washed away, it must be 

 cleansed with the feathers of an eagle or of any other 

 large bird which are of a stiff quality. Moreover 8 

 caterpillars should be swept away and moths killed, 

 which generally linger among the hives and are 

 destructive to the bees ; for they both gnaw at the 

 waxen combs and from their dung breed worms which 

 we call " hive-moths." Therefore, at the season 9 

 when the mallows flower, when the moths are 

 most numerous, if a bronze vessel of the shape of a 

 milestone is placed amongst the hives in the evening 



485 



