A YEAR AMONG THE BEES. 
99 
in which I have known a railroad company to pay for 
breakage of honey. 
There is less danger of breakage by freight than by express. 
Besides danger of breakage, there is risk of losing in various 
ways. You may not be able to collect pay for your honey. 
If sent on commission, the price obtained may be less than 
the published market report. You have no means generally 
to know how correct the claims for breakage may be. In 
fact, unless you know your consignee to be a thoroughly 
honest man, you are almost entirely at his mercy. A quarter 
or half a pound may be taken off each case by the claim that 
it is custom to reject fractions. Taking all these things into 
consideration, together with the cost of freight and shipping- 
cases, and it must be a good price that will justify a man to 
ship off honey to the neglect of his home market. If shipped 
to be sold on commission, providing he ships to anear market, 
the price should be at least 1 % cents per pound more than he 
can get in his home market, to justify his shipping. If he 
ships to a distant market the difference should be still more, 
as the additional freight may make a difference of one cent 
per pound or more, and the risk of breakage becomes greater. 
BRINGING BEES HOME IN THE FALL. 
In the fall, the bees must be brought home from the out 
apiary so as to be wintered in the cellar. If I were in a 
latitude where out-door wintering was safe, I should be glad 
to leave them the year round without moving. I have studied 
somewhat upon some plan by which they might be safely 
left, and am not without hope that sometime cellar wintering 
may be so perfected that I can build at little expense a cellar 
for each out apiary where the bees may be left without 
attention from fall till spring. I have not reached that point 
yet, so I feel obliged to have all my bees brought home in 
the fall. There are always a few things upon which bees can 
work till quite late ; so it is desirable to be as late as possible 
bringing them home. They must, however, be brought 
home early enough so they will be sure of a good flight after 
