324 SHIPPING AND TRANSPORTING BEES. 



The shipping boxes in which bees are sent from Italy^ are 

 about three inches deep, by three inches in width, and four 

 inches in length, with two small frames of comb, one with 

 thick sugar syrup, the other dry. From fifty to seventy-five 

 bees are put with one queen in each box. Air holes are cut 

 into the sides of the boxes, and these are fastened together 

 in a pyramidal shape, with an outer covering of tin, to which 

 is fastened the handle. Queens thus put up, reached us after 

 thirty-six days of confinement with very little loss, and it is 

 in this way that the greatest number of imported queens were 

 received. 



597. We might mention in connection with this, an oft- 

 repeated incident, so touching and sweet, as to seem more 

 like a romancer's fable, or a poetic idyl, than a mere fact. 

 On receiving the boxes containing Italian queens, we noticed 

 that frequently all the bees shipped with the queen had died, 

 she being the only one alive in her prison. We afterward 

 found out that the faithful little subjects denied themselves 

 nourishment, and starved to death, sacrificing themselves, that 

 their queen might not be deprived of food. 



Mailing Queens. 



598. At the present day queens are forwarded almost 

 exclusively by mail. To Mr. Frank Benton is due the credit 

 of first mailing queens safely across the ocean, but the mail- 

 ing of them, with more or less success on the American con- 

 tinent, has been practiced for years. Messrs. J. H. Townley 

 and H. Alley, appear to have been the first to succeed, as 

 early as 1868. 



Yet the mails are so roughly handled generally, that we 

 would not advise the sending of valuable queens in this way. 



The food given is the Scholz candy (613) made of pow- 

 dered sugar and honey kneaded together. A sufficient num- 

 ber of bees must be put with the queen to keep her warm 



