REQDISITES OF A GOOD HIVE. Ill 



keeping, as in other things, a man must first understand his 

 business, and then proceed on the good old maxim, that " the 

 hand of the diligent maketh rich," 



It possesses no talismanic influence by which it, can con- 

 vert a bad situation for honey, into a good one ; or give the 

 Apiarian an abundant harvest whether the season is produc- 

 tive or otherwise. 



It cannot enable the cultivator rapidly to multiply his 

 stocks, and yet in the same season, to secure surplus honey 

 from his bees. As well might the breeder of poultry pretend 

 that in the same year and from the same stock, he can both 

 raise the greatest number of chickens, and sell the largest 

 number of eggs. 



Worse than all, it cannot furnish the many advantages 

 enumerated, and yet be made in as little time, or quite as 

 cheap as a hive which proves, in the end, to be a very dear 

 bargain ! 



I have not constructed my hive in accordance with crude 

 theories, or mere conjectures, and then insisted that the bees 

 must flourish in such a fanciful contrivance ; but I have 

 studied, for many years, most carefully, the nature of the 

 honey-bee ; and have diligently compared my observations 

 with those of writers and practical cultivators, who have 

 spent their lives in extending the sphere of Apiarian knowl- 

 edge ; and as the result, have endeavored to adapt my inven- 

 tion to the actual habits and wants of the bee ; and to remedy 

 the many difficulties with which I have found its successful 

 culture to be beset. And more than this, I have actually 

 tested its merits, by experiments long continued and on a 

 large scale, so that I might not deceive both myself and 

 others, and add another to the many useless contrivances 

 which have deluded and disgusted a too credulous public. 

 I would, however, most earnestly repudiate all claims to 



