582 Transactions of the Society. 



certain that not until very recent times have its ravages become so 

 wide-spread as to make it the terror of bee-keepers. Since the 

 investigation to which I now invite attention conclusively shows 

 that a bacillus is the mischief-worker, it will be at once understood 

 why modern methods of management have been the occasion of 

 spreading far and wide that which formerly existed, though 

 confined to narrow limits. In ancient days bees rarely changed 

 hands except at the death of the owner, and in our country, at 

 least, the selling of a hive was even half a century back dis- 

 countenanced as " unlucky " ; but now bee-dealing is an established 

 industry not only here but on the continents of Europe and 

 America, and the stock of the bee farmer having once become 

 infected, is inevitably the means of distributing the fatal germs 

 into the private apiaries which he supplies. Man not alone then 

 suffers from diseases propagated by modern civilisation, but the 

 animals which he has associated with himself necessarily suffer 

 with him. Let us now consider this matter under three heads : — 

 Firstly, the nature of this germ disease ; secondly, the means of 

 its propagation ; and thirdly, the method of its cure. 



1st. The nature of foul brood as a germ disease. — If a comb 

 be removed from near the centre of a healthy hive during the 

 summer months, its cells will normally be filled with eggs, larvae, 

 and pupae in every stage of development. The eggs as left by the 

 ovipositor of the queen or mother adhere commonly by the end to 

 the base of the cells they occupy, and favoured by the high 

 temperature constantly maintained within the hive, the germinal 

 vesicle at about the end of three days matures into a larva ready 

 for hatching. These eggs I have shown are liable to the disease 

 even before they leave the body of the mother, but most careful 

 microscopic examination is needful to make this apparent (and of 

 which I shall speak presently more particularly). On the contrary, 

 the larvae, which are constantly fed by the workers, so change in 

 appearance soon after infection, that a practised eye at once detects 

 the presence of the disease. Whilst healthy their bodies are of a 

 beautiful pearly whiteness, lying, at first floating, in the abundant 

 pabulum the nurses are ever at hand to supply. As they grow 

 they curl themselves at the bottom of the cells until these become 

 too strait for their occupants, which now advance the head to be 

 in readiness for the cocoon-spinning which follows upon the close 

 of the eating stage. When the disease strikes the larvae they 

 move uneasily in their cells, and often then present the dorsal 

 surface to its mouth, as I have indicated in the illustration of 

 diseased comb, fig. 134, so that mere posture is no insufficient 

 evidence of an unhealthy condition. The colour changes to yellow, 

 passing on by degrees towards a pale brown, whilst the skin 

 becomes flaccid and opaque ; death soon occurs, when the body, now 



