SEASONS OF DEPRIVATION. 363 



can be taken without molesting the whole community, or 

 suffering any loss from that partial destruction of the combs, 

 which always takes place, more or less, in the cottage hive. 



In order however to prevent the suffocation of the bees, 

 and still to obtain a proportionate quantity of their riches, 

 without undergoing the difficult and tedious process of de- 

 privation, let the following plan be adopted. In the month 

 of March, cut off three or four bands of the top of the hive, 

 and place over the orifice a small hive of from four to six 

 inches in diameter. As the honey season approaches, the 

 bees will proceed to construct their combs in the small 

 hive, and by August or September, it will be full of excel- 

 lent honey-comb, which may be taken away without the 

 least fear of subjecting the bees to famine, as the very act 

 of filling the small hive presupposes that all the cells in the 

 hive are full, and consequently an adequate supply of pro- 

 visions exists for the winter. One of these small hives will 

 weigh from fifteen to eighteen pounds, and supposing that 

 it fetches at the market only one shilling a pound, which 

 is a very low price indeed for pure white honey comb, fit for 

 the breakfast table or the dessert, it follows that a clear profit 

 of fifteen or eighteen shillings has been gained, and the 

 proprietor is still in possession of his stock of bees ; whereas 

 had he suffocated them, the produce might have perhaps 

 been greater by a few pounds of honey, but then the bees 

 would be suffocated, and the most valuable part of his pro- 

 perty thereby destroyed. 



There are two seasons of deprivation, the spring and the 

 autumn, and each has its strenuous advocates. We, how- 

 ever, strongly recommend the former, on account of the 

 certainty which then exists of the bees being able to re- 

 plenish the vacuum before the winter sets in; whereas in the 

 autumnal deprivation, the vacuum exists during the whole 

 of the winter, which, on account of the foul and humid air 

 which is engendered, is highly injurious to the bees. It may 



