CHAPTER. XI 
THE MYSTERY OF THE SWARM 
HE old “swarm in May,” beloved of ancient 
beemen, is rapidly becoming a thing of the 
past. Modern hives and modern methods, 
although they have not as yet achieved their main 
intent of abolishing natural swarming altogether, 
yet tend to bring this extraordinary ebullition of 
hive-life to its fulfilment later and later in each 
year. Far from being a virtue, as of old, an 
early swarm, or indeed any swarm at all, is now 
accounted a misfortune, even a downright dis- 
grace, in scientific beemanship. And yet the bees, 
though easy to discourage, are hard to teach. In 
spite of roomy hives and a watchful bee-master 
ready to give them an unbroken succession of 
young and fertile queens, and a whole houseful 
of new furniture at a moment’s notice, still the 
bees go on playing this mad game of wholesale 
truantry, and still the bee-keeper must stand look- 
ing hopelessly on from the midst of his elaborate 
appliances, while his property sings about his ears, 
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