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MEXICO. 



hive is generally made out of a log of wood from 

 two to three feet long, and eight or ten inches in 

 diameter, hollowed out, and closed at the ends by 

 circular doors, cemented closely to the wood, but 

 capable of being removed at pleasure. 



Some persons use cylindrical hives made of 

 earthenware, instead of the clumsy apparatus of 

 wood ; these are relieved by raised figures and 

 circular rings, so as to form rather handsome or- 

 naments in the verandah of a house, where they 

 are suspended by cords from the roof, in the 

 same manner that the wooden ones in the villages 

 are hung to the eaves of the cottages. On one 

 side of the hive, half-way between the ends, there 

 is a small hole made, just large enough for a load- 

 ed bee to enter, and shaded by a projection to 

 prevent the rain from trickling in. In this hole, 

 generally representing the mouth of a man, or 

 some monster, the head of which is moulded in 

 the clay of the hive, a bee is constantly station- 

 ed ; whose ofRce is no sinecure, for the hole is so 

 small, he has to draw back every time a bee wish- 

 es to enter or to leave the hive. A gentleman 

 told me that the experiment had been made, by 



