252 The Honey-Makers 



Brugsch also describes a contract in which it is stated : 



" I take you to wife and bind myself to furnish to you 

 annually twelve pots of honey." 



We know that honey was a common ingredient of the 

 medicines of the Egyptians, and that it was added to the 

 most obnoxious compounds, as of lizard's blood, teeth of 

 swine, putrid meat and stinking fat, the moisture from pig's 

 ears, and excreta of all kinds. 



Some of the old remedies, however, were far from objec- 

 tionable, as, for instance, the following : — 



To draw blood from a wound, take of wax, fat, date- 

 wine, honey, and boiled horn each one part. 



It was considered really strengthening to the hair to 

 anoint it with the tooth of a donkey crushed in honey! 



Bees were carefully cultivated by the ancient Egyptians, 

 who had floating apiaries, or boats bearing hives, that as- 

 cended the Nile, and drifted slowly down, following the 

 blossoming of the plants along the banks as the annual 

 inundation receded. 



This custom still prevailed in modern times, as the writ- 

 ings of travellers testify. Barges or flatboats proceeded 

 up the river, gathering the hives of the villages as they 

 went, and after a migration of two or three months returned 

 the laden hives to their owners. 



It is probable that the ancient bees are the progenitors 

 of those found in Egypt to-day, gray-haired with two bright 

 orange bands on the large end of the abdomen — very yel- 

 low and very cross. 



In one author we read the following concerning bee- 

 keeping in ancient Egypt : — 



" To the garden department belonged the care of the 

 bees, which were kept in hives very much like our own. 

 Honey was thought of great importance, both for house- 

 hold purposes and for an offering to the gods." 



