Insects. 27 



just knocked out; they will begin to lick the first drops of honey which trickle on to 

 the hoard, and will he led up by the scent of that which you have poured into the 

 comhs, to mix themselves with the other Bees. 



" They will take to one another when they have helped each other to clean off the 

 sugar with their tongues. The fact of their helping each other in their troubles makes 

 them friends, just as it does grown men, and children, who are small men and women." 

 —p. 68. 



The entire detail of management is thus unfolded and explained in 

 plain unadorned language ; and you cannot resist the conviction that 

 the author is well acquainted with the subject on which he is writing. 

 This cannot be said of many authors of bee-books : these works are 

 for the most part such wretched compilations, that one scarcely ever 

 by chance meets with a paragraph in them worth the trouble of read- 

 ing. Mr. Cotton, like the rest, has drawn abundantly from other 

 sources, yet it is all fairly done ; the original and copied parts of his 

 book stand out distinctly from each other ; there is no appropriation 

 of another man's property without acknowledgment : all is fair and 

 above-board even to the " Prelude of Mottoes," extending through 

 five pages ; a rare selection in truth, and a fair quiz on a prevailing 

 passion. 



We must give one quotation from More's ^ England's Interest,'* re- 

 printed in ^My Bee-Book;' it includes Queen Elizabeth's receipt for 

 making metheglin, and the author's encomium on that highly prized 

 and ancient beverage. 



" Take a bushel of sweet briar-leaves, as much of thyme ; half a bushel of rosema- 

 ry-leaves, and a peck of bay-leaves ; and, having well-washed them, boil them in a cop- 

 per of fair water: let them boil the space of half an hour or better, and then pour out 

 all the water and herbs into a fat, and let it stand till it be but milk warm ; then strain 

 the water from the herbs, and take to every gallon of water, one gallon of the finest 

 honey, and beat it together for the space of an hour ; then let it stand 2 days, stirring 

 it well twice or thrice a day ; then take the liquor and boil it again, and skim it as 

 long as there remains any scum ; when it is clear, put into a fat as before, and let it 

 stand to cool. You must then have in readiness a kive of new ale or beer, which as 

 soon as you have emptied suddenly, presently put in the metheglin, and let it stand 

 three days a working, and then tun it up in barrels, tying at every tap-hole, by a pack- 

 thread, a little bag of beaten cloves and mace, to the value of an ounce. It must 

 stand half a year before it be drank. 



" As the vertues of honey are transcendent, so are the vertues of meath and methe- 

 glin : when old, it is a wine most agreeable to the stomach. It recovereth, 1. A lost 

 appetite. 2. It openeth the passage for the spirit and breath. 3. It softeneth the 



* ' England's Interest : or, the Gentleman and Farmers Friend,' &c. By Sir J. 

 More, London, Printed and Sold by J. How, at the Seven Stars in Talbot-Court, in 

 Grace-Church-Street, 1707. 



