Observations on Honey. 393 



cottagers to cultivate their gardens instead of sleeping away 

 their spare time, or spending it in places ruinous to themselves 

 and their families. Those gentlemen v^^ho encourage apiarian 

 societies will render valuable assistance to their cottagers. For- 

 merly they cultivated bees to their profit, and we hope to see 

 them do so again. The keeping of bees would prove also a 

 source of pleasure, and the interest they would take in observ- 

 ing the habits and industry of these insects would often divert 

 their minds from heavier cares. 



Cossey Hall Gardens, December 26. 1838. 



Art. XII. On Honey. By J. Wighton. 



The popular name of virgin honey, as applied to that which 

 is taken from hives on the depriving system, and from late weak 

 swarms on the destroying plan, arises from an idea, prevalent 

 among old bee-keepers, that the purest honey was to be ob- 

 tained from a swarm thrown off by a swarm of the same season, 

 and whose queens they believed to be virgins. 



No brood being in the combs of such hives is, however, to be 

 traced to very different causes ; for late weak swarms from old 

 stocks, provided they be thrown off at the same date, are equally 

 without brood combs, and contain as pure honey as those er- 

 roneously called virgin hives. 



When a late swarm is thrown off, be it from an old or a new 

 stock, the season is past for the production of brood, while the 

 weakness of the swarm is a still more powerful reason for its 

 non-appearance, the number of bees not being large enough to 

 keep up the temperature requisite for maturing the brood. 



The common supposition, that the combs are discoloured by 

 the brood and pollen (or brood bread), is only partially correct; 

 for, in weak hives, the cells containing them are not much dis- 

 coloured ; while in strong stocks, not only they, but the out- 

 side combs, soon become dark; a proof that the discoloration is 

 more the effect of great heat, the cells being flexible, and the 

 constant traffic of the bees having the pollen about them, than 

 of the brood. 



As a farther proof that virginity of the queens has nothing to 

 do with the purity of the honey, old blackened combs will yield 

 honey as pure as fresh ones, provided the honey itself be of the 

 same age, and gathered from the same kind of flowers. This 

 fact is very easily ascertained by piercing the cells, to let the 

 honey drip out. Much good honey is spoiled by its being- 

 squeezed from the combs. The combs should be cut or care- 

 fully broken, and allowed to drip through a muslin bag. 



Cossey Hall Gardens, April 2. 1 840. 

 1840. August. d d 



