PUTTING ON AND TAKING OFF BOXES. 175 
that perhaps a thousand or two young workers are 
added every week, and these have to learn by the same 
means — it would seem, if we studied our own interest, 
we would give them all the facility possible for enter- 
ing the boxes. What way so easy for them as to have 
a passage, when they get to the top, between each 
comb ? That bees do not know all roads about the 
hive, can be partially proved by opening the door of 
a glass hive. Most of the bees about leaving, instead 
of going to the bottom for their exit, where they have 
departed many times, seem to know nothing of the 
way, but vainly try to get out through the glass, 
whenever light is admitted. 
I am so well convinced of this, that I take some 
pains to accommodate them with a passage between 
each comb ; they will then at least lose no time by 
mistakes between the wrong combs, crowding and 
elbowing their way back through a dense mass of bees 
which impede every step, until again at the top per- 
haps between the same combs, perhaps right, perhaps 
farther off than at first ; when I suppose they try it 
again ; as boxes are filled sometimes under just such 
circumstances. 
To assist them as much as possible, when new hives 
are used for swarms, I wait till the hive is nearly filled 
before making the holes to ascertain the direction of 
the combs. We all know it is uncertain which 
way the combs will be built, when the swarm is put 
in, unless guide-combs are used.* When holes are 
Perhaps Miner’s cross-bar hive would do it 
