HIVES WITH IMMOVABLE COMBS. 



129 



CHAPTER IV. 



THE BEE-HIVES. HIVES WITH IJIMOVABLE COMBS. 



275. The first hives that were provided for bees were as 

 rude as their natural abodes. We do not need to look back 

 very far to remember the " bee-gum," so called, probably, 

 because it had often been made out of the gum tree, with 

 two sticks crossing in the middle, and a rough board nailed 

 on top, while a notch in the lower end formed the entrance. 

 In the Old World, they manufactured straw or willow 

 " skeps " and pottery hives, which are still used in Asia and 

 Africa. The earthen hive was simply a tube, laid on its 

 side, and closed at each end with a movable wooden disk. 

 This disk was removed to take the honey, which is always 

 located at the back part of the hives. 



fig. 45. 



EARTHEN HIVE OF AFRICA AND CYPRUS. 



{FTOin "L'Apicoltore," Milan.) 



These earthen hives were, unquestionably, the most 

 sensible of those old kinds. In the Islands of Greece they 

 were set in thick stone walls, built on purpose with the 

 entrance on one side of the wall. Sometimes they were 

 located in the walls of the houses, and the honey was 

 removed from the inside of the house, or, if in walls, from 

 behind, out of the flight of bees. 

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