292 FIFTY YBAES AMONG THE BEES 



About that time my friend E. R. Root happened to he here, 

 and strongly advised as the best way out of the dilemma to have 

 a furnace put in — one big enough to heat the whole house, and 

 of such character as to burn wood, green or dry, coal, hard or 

 soft, and indeed any thing having any inclination toward com- 

 bustibility. I followed his advice, or rather I outran it, for I 

 got a larger furnace than he thought advisable, the fire-pot 

 being 27 inches in diameter. I am not sorry the furnace is so 

 large so far as heating the house is concerned, for it makes a 

 delightful summer temperature in any part of the house, no 

 matter how cold the weather, without any of that unpleasant 

 anil unwholesome burnt-air effeci. lint it made a matter of 

 impossibility for me to think of keeping the temperature of the 

 bee-room down to 4.5 degTees; and since that time, instead of 

 having to make an effort to keep the cellar warm enough, the 

 problem has been to keep it cool enough. 



UNFAVORABLE CONDITIONS. 



Conditions for successful wintering were by no means the 

 best. 



The workmen that set up the furnace were late in finishing; 

 up the last ]iart of the work in the cellar, so that the bees were 

 not put in till the 8lh of December. On that day the tempera- 

 ture was 8 degrees below zero. It would have been much better 

 to leave them out for another fliglit if I had been sure of a 

 day warm enough without waiting too long. But I was not 

 sure of lliat. and I thought it better for them to he taken in in 

 rather bad condition than to run the risk of leaving them out 

 longer. The sequel showed 1 '^^'as wise in so doing, for no day 

 warm enough for a flight came until February 26. 



A Ihin partition of lath and plaster is all that separates the 

 bee-room from the room in which the furnace is located, and 

 the thermometer in the bee-room generally showed a tempera- 

 ture of 50 degrees. Some of the hot-air pipes pass through the 

 bee-room overhead; and a thermometer laid on one of the two 

 liives directly under one of these pipes nearest the furnace 

 showed a temperature of 70 degrees. The pipe is covered with 

 asbestos paper, but there was only a space of about three inches 

 between the pipe and the top of the hives. There was plenty of 



