VIU PKErACE. 



of the various bar-and-frame liives which is at all difficult when 

 frequent practice has rendered the bee-keeper familiar with them- 

 Sach explicit directions are herein given as to how the right 

 operations may be performed at the right times, that a novice may 

 at once commence to use the modern hives. The word "new- 

 fangled" has done good service for the indolent and prejudiced,- 

 but we trust that our readers will be of a very different class. Let 

 them give a fair trial to the modern appliances for the humane and 

 depriving system of bee-keeping, and they wiU find offered to them 

 an entirely new field of interest and observation. At present, our 

 continental neighbours far surpass us as bee-masters ; but we trust 

 that the season of 1865, if the summer be fine, wiU prove a turning 

 point in the course of English bee-keeping. There is little doubt 

 that a greater number of intelligent and influential persons in this 

 country will become bee-keepers than has ever been the case before. 

 Our task would have lost half its interest, did we not hope that 

 it would result in something beyond the encouragement of a refined 

 and interesting amusement for the leisurely classes. The social im- 

 portance of bee keeping as a source of pecuniaryprofit for small farmers 

 and agricultural labourers, has never been appreciated as it deserves. 

 Yet these persons wiU not, of themselves, lay aside the bungling and 

 wasteful plan of destroying the bees, or learn without being taught 

 the only proper method, that of deprivation. Their educated neigh- 

 bours when once interested in bee-keeping, wiU be the persons to intro- 

 duce the more profitable system of humane bee-keeping. The clergy, 

 especially, as permanent residents in the country, may have great 

 influence in this respect. There is not a rural or suburban parish 

 in the kingdom in which bee-keeping might not be largely extended, 

 and the well being of all but the very poorest inhabitants would 

 be greatly promoted. Not only would the general practice of bee- 

 keeping add largely to the national resources, but that addition 

 would chiefly fall to the share of those classes to whom it would be 

 of most value. Moreover, in the course of thus adding to their 



