GLEAM. 21 



good, common, box-hives. There had been ten the 

 previous spring. The increase for the year had been 

 but seven. The boxes had been put on the last of 

 August, and were nearly all full, so that now I took 

 from each hive an average of twenty-four pounds of 

 good box-honey. I learned that father had taken 

 from the ten old hives thirty pounds each just after 

 white-clover, in July. Thus the result of the ten 

 hives for the year had been over seventy pounds of 

 good comb honey per hive, and an increase of seven 

 swarms. A very good result, indeed, as it then 

 seemed to me, for I knew scarcely anything about 

 bees or their management. While at the college I 

 had seen bees in movable-comb hives, and had two 

 or three times heard Prof. Cook speak in most en- 

 thusiastic terms of the pleasures and profits of bee- 

 keeping. With the superior wisdom common to 

 boys of sixteen, I had regarded his enthusiasm as an 

 amiable weakness, and had smiled at the idea of 

 making much money from so small a business as 

 keeping bees. I had, however, procured a copy of 

 his little Manual of the Apiary, intending to give it 

 to father that he might get some hints to increase 

 his enjoyment with his pets. Now I went to my 

 trunk and looked out the book, to see if it had any- 

 thing to say about wintering bees, for I remembered 

 hearing father say that this was the great stumbling- 

 block in the way of successful bee-keeping. Often 



