210 THE HIVE AND HONEY-BEE. 



all the ingenuity and expense lavished upon -vvhich, arc 

 -known, Ly the better informed, to be as unnecessary as a 

 costly machine for hfting up bread and butter, and gently 

 pushing it into the mouth and down v the throat of an 

 active and healthy child^. 



The Rev. John Thorley, in his " Female Monarchy^'' 

 published at London, in 1744, appears to have first intro- 

 duced the prax3tice of stupefying bees by the narcotic 

 fumes of the " puff ball " {Fungus pidveriilentus)^ dried 

 till it Avill hold fire like tinder. The same effect has 

 been produced by pushing a rag, saturated with chloro- 

 form or ether, mto the entrance of the hive, and closing 

 all tight, to prevent the escape of the fumes. The bees 

 soon drojD motionless from their combs, and recover again 

 after a short exposure to the air. 



Some of my readers anay suppose that such an easy 

 mode of stupefying bees would very greatly facilitate the 



of this invention is to elevate frames, one at a time, into a euse iHtJi glass sides, 

 60 tliat they may be examined without risk of annoyance from the bees. Great 

 ingenuity is exhibited by the inventor of this very costly and very complicated 

 hive, Tvho seems to imagine that smoke "must be injurious both to the bees and 

 their brood." Even if a little smoke is so injurious, the Apiarian, by sweetened 

 water, or by drumming upon a hive, after closing its entrance, can cause the bees 

 to fill themselves with honey (p. 2T),when all their combs may bo safely lifted out. 

 A Iluber-bive, or one with movable bars, may be much more safely managed 

 th.ln any one wliich proposes to elevate the frames, with ..at permitting them to be 

 pu<<hed apart (p. 150j. A single hive, the an-angeme^ a of which are such as to 

 Diaim and irritate bees, is more to be dreaded in aj- 4-piary than a thousand of 

 proper construction ; as it eduoates bees to regard f- leir keeper in the light of an 



On p. 15, I have spoken of the bar-Mve, as at "'east one hundred years old. 

 From " A Journey into Greece, by George Whr-'.ler, Esq.," made in 1675-6, it 

 appears that it was, at that time, in common use J^Here, and, probably, even then an 

 old invention ; he describes how it was used for ^rrninic artificial swarms, and re- 

 moving spare honey. As the new swarms wve made by dividing the combs be- 

 tween two hives, and no mention is madft f< giving the queenless one a royal cell 

 — those old observers were probably acquainted wifh the fact that they could rear 

 one from the worker-brood. Huber ^ays:— "Montieelli, a Neapolitan Professor, 

 claims that the plan of artificial swa- 'oing was borrowed from Favignaua, and that 

 the practice is so ancient that eve (he Latin names are* reserved by the inhabi- 

 tants in their procedure." 



