WINTER WORK ON THE BEE-FARM 89 
sell in the spring, either empty or stocked with 
bees. Then here is the foundation mill.” 
_He turned to the contrivance I had noticed on 
my entry. The thin amber sheets of material, like 
crinkled glass, were still flowing out between the 
rollers. He took a sheet of it as it fell, and held it 
up to the light. A fine hexagonal pattern covered 
it completely from edge to edge. 
“ This,’”’ he said, ‘‘ we call super-foundation. It 
is pure refined wax, rolled into sheets as thin as 
paper, and milled on both sides with the shapes of 
the cells. All combs now are built by the bees on 
this artificial foundation; and there is enough wax 
here, thin as it is, to make the entire honeycomb. 
The bees add nothing to it, but simply knead it and 
draw it out into a comb two inches wide; and so all 
the time needed for wax-making by the bees is 
saved just when time is most precious—during the 
short season of the honey-flow.”’ 
He took down a sheet from another pile close at 
hand. 
‘* All that thin foundation,’’ he explained, ‘‘ is for 
section-honey, and will be eaten. But this you 
could not eat. This is brood-foundation, made 
extra strong to bear the great heat of the lower 
hive. It is put into the brood-nest, and the cells 
reared on it are the cradles for the young bees. 
See how dense and brown it is, and how thick; it 
is six or seven times as heavy as the other. But 
it is all pure wax, though not so refined, and is 
made in the same way, serving the same useful, 
time-saving purpose.”’ 
We moved on towards the store-rooms, out of the 
clatter of the machinery. 
