SWARMING. 25 



for the good folks of the village to commence on such 

 occasions a terrible noise of tanging and ringing with 

 frying-pan and key. This is done with the absurd no- 

 tion that the bees are charmed with the clangorous din, 

 and may by it be induced to settle as near as possible to 

 the source of such sweet sounds. This is, however, quite 

 a mistake : there are other and better means for- the 

 purpose. The practice of ringing was originally adopted 

 for a different and far more sensible object — viz., for the 

 purpose of giving notice that a swarm had issued forth, 

 and that the owner was anxious to claim the right of 

 following, even though it should alight on a neighbour's 

 premises. It would be curious to trace how this ancient 

 ceremony has thus got corrupted from the original 

 design. 



In case the bees do not speedily after swarming mani- 

 fest signs of settling, a few handfuls of sand or loose 

 mould may be thrown up in the air so as to fall among 

 the winged throng ; they mistake this for rain, and then 

 very quickly determine upon settling. Some persons 

 squirt a little water from a garden engine in' order to 

 produce the same effect. 



There are, indeed, many ingenious devices used by 

 apiarians for decoying the swarms. Mr.' Langstroth 

 mentions a plan of stringing ddad bees together, and 

 tying a bunch of them on any shrub or low tree upon 

 which it is desirable that they should alight; another 

 plan is, to hang some black woven material near the 



