REQUISITES OF AN IMPROVED HIVE. 113 



An improved hive is one which contains, in addition, a 

 separate apartment in which the bees can be induced to lay 

 up the surplus portion of their stores, for the use of their 

 owner. All the various hives in common use, are only mod- 

 ifications of this latter hive, and, as a general rule, they are 

 bad, exactly in proportion as they depart from it. Not one 

 of them offers any remedy for the loss of the queen, or in- 

 deed for most of the casulties to which bees are exposed : 

 they form no reliable basis for any new system of manage- 

 ment ; and hence the cultivation of bees, is substantially 

 where it was, fifty years ago, and the Apiarian as entirely 

 dependent as ever, upon all the whims and caprices of an 

 insect which may be made completely subject to his control. 



No hive which does not furnish a thorough control over 

 every comb, can be considered as any substantial advance 

 on the simple improved or chamber hive. Of all such 

 hives, the one which with the least expense, gives the great- 

 est amount of protection, and the readiest access to the 

 spare honey boxes, is the best. 



Having thus enumerated the tests to which all hives ought 

 to be subjected, and by which they should stand or fall, I 

 submit them to the candid examination of practical, com- 

 mon sense bee-keepers, who have had the largest experience 

 in the management of bees, and are most conversant with 

 the evils of the present system ; and who are therefore best 

 fitted to apply them to an invention, which, if I may be par- 

 doned for using the enthusiastic language of an experienced 

 Apiarian on examining its practical workings, " introduces, 

 not simply an improvement, but a revolution in bee-keeping." 

 10* 



