APPENDIX. |05 



portions of creation there is design and perfect fitness wor- 

 thy of their Divine Author. 



From the earliest ages the honey bee has furnished a most 

 interestuig study to'thenatutalist and the philosopher. Men 

 of superior intellectual endowments and mental culture have 

 found here a subject for deep and earnest, contemplation. 

 Indeed, all who may study the habits of this wonderful in- 

 sect and witness its curious operations may peruse an 

 instructive page in the Book of Nature, and trace therein 

 the glorious handiwork of God. And not only does the 

 science of the honey-bee furnish us profitable moral lessons, 

 but an application of the principle^'of its culture is often a 

 fruitful source of pecuniary profit.^' 



The author of the foregoing pages, having enjoyed the 

 benefit of a long experience, during which he has patiently 

 and experimentally studied the nature and economy of the 

 honey bee, and witnessed the ravages of its most destructive 

 enemy, the moth, believes that an era in the management of 

 the apiary will occur not far hence, in which the theory he 

 propounded some twenty years since, in his " Manual on 

 Bees," setting forth the rationale of swarming, and the effect 

 of damp and rainy weather upon second and after swarms, 

 will be better understood by the majority of culturists. 

 May the "book-learning" of the past dawn auspiciously 

 upon the present, lead the persevering apiarist along the 

 path to success, and illumine those understandin g which are 

 darkened by the prevalent error that this calling is unpro- 

 ductive of pecuniary advantages. 



We have ever believed that the objections often urged 

 against this pursuit, and which have really rendered it so 

 precarious in the hands of many, can be wholly removed, 

 and that it may eventually become an important branch of 

 rural economy. 



