258 THE BEE-KEEPER’S MANUAL. 
have been three degrees observed. The following is 
a description of the first and most malignant of 
these—the genuine foul brood, or “ brood pest.” At 
first, some ten or twenty cells are observed to have 
their covers sunken in, some of them with a small 
round hole. Upon one of these being opened the 
larva is found of a brownish colour, and with 
its head downwards; it usually dies before turning 
into a nymph, and shortly after the sealing. It is 
rare, in this most serious form of the disease, to find 
foul larve still unsealed. The form of the grub 
soon ceases to be recognisable, and it melts away 
into a clayey, slimy material, which, in from ten to 
fourteen days, dries up into a nearly black crust on 
the lower side of the cell. The bees attempt to 
gnaw down the cells to the middle wall, but, as the 
disease advances, they let the mass of corruption 
alone; they fly forth but little, and devote their 
whole attention to expelling the foul stench by 
ventilating with their wings. Sometimes, upon a 
fine spring or autumn day (for this disease is 
peculiar to no one season, though we have here, for 
convenience, placed it along with others), they will 
forsake the hive in a swarm. If brownish or black 
grains or crumbs appear upon the  floor-board, 
which, when rubbed, turn into a smeary stinking 
mass, it may be set down as certain that this form 
of foul brood is present. From a quarter to a half 
of the larve soon die, though, even in the worst 
cases, they some of them continue alive. 
The second degree is a mere shadow of the first. 
The complaint is nothing like so rapid, nor yet so 
