BEE-KEEPING. 35 



It has been asserted that Bees will fly five or six miles 

 for honey, if a supply nearer home be not obtainable; 

 they may, but such an extreme labour would not allow 

 the stock to thrive. Too much time and muscular 

 strength would be consumed in making the journey. 

 The great danger to Bees in town is their liability to be 

 tempted into shops, such as grocers, confectioners, &c., 

 where they get bewildered, fly to the window, and, in 

 the vain attempt to penetrate the glass, they die. Brew- 

 eries are also fatal places, the sweet wort attracting 

 numbers who perish by drowning. 



Associations and societies for the encouragement of 

 agriculture, horticulture, and various other sister sciences, 

 have for many years abounded in England, but it was 

 reserved for 1874, to see the establishment of the first 

 one for the encouragement and promotion of Bee- 

 keeping, when the British Bee-keepers' Association, 

 presided over by Sir John Lubbock, sprung into exist- 

 ence, through the exertions of nearly all our own lead- 

 ing Apiarians, whose observations and writings have 

 contributed so largely to apiarian science. The Associ- 

 ation, which did me the honour to elect me Honorary 

 Secretary, held an exhibition at the Crystal Palace, in 

 September, 1874, of " Hives, Bees, and their Produce," of 

 far greater magnitude than was ever gathered together 

 in Great Britain before ; these Exhibitions have been 

 continued at the same place, the Alexandra Palace, 

 and at South Kensington, besides giving birth to many 

 Provincial Associations and Exhibitions, the result being 

 that Bee-Keeping in England has received an impetus, 

 which, it is hoped, will eventually be productive of great 

 good. 



Such competitive exhibitions surpass everything else 

 as a means of improving all sciences, and the present 



D 2 



