August 14, 1884. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
155 
pail. We have the old queen caged and hanging in the top of 
the shep containing hev swarm. The pail is well sprinkled with 
syrup scented with a few drops of essence of peppermint. Then 
with a quick sharp shake (more of a let-go and a catch) we 
deposit one lot of bees in the pail and the next moment toss in 
the other.s. We take up the pail, shake, and pour the bees all 
together into the back of the hive, drawing the quilt over. In 
ten minutes the quilt may be lifted gently at the back and 
shaken, when bees adhering to it will be cast between the frames; 
the frames can then be drawn close or nearly close together, and 
the dummy moved up. If many bees are against the dummy 
next morning will be as well to adjust it. when all the bees will 
be clustering in the frames and comb-building. The old queen is 
taken from the cage and killed. If new stocks are not required 
the driven bees can be joined to other hives by first well sprinkling 
the occupiers with scented syrup and giving them a few puffs of 
smoke, and then casting the di-iven bees similarly scented on the 
top of or behind the panes.—P. H. P. 
BEES. 
CURE FOR STINGS. 
Many people are of the opinion that after they have been 
stung repeatedly they become inoculated and do not suffer 
thereby, the virus ceasing to take effect on the system. As that 
is not the case with everyone that has come within my expe¬ 
rience I cannot endorse it, neither can reliance be placed on the 
efficacy of many of the so-called remedies. With most people, 
beyond the inconvenience of a swollen face and the slight irrita¬ 
tion at the first, stings do not otherwise trouble them ; but to 
some people stings cause much suffering, and are really danger¬ 
ous from the effect the poison has upon the blood and nervous 
system. 1 am acquainted with many such, and who, though 
stung often, have never become inoculated. With all such 
persons none of the nostrums so often recommended alleviates 
the distress of the patient. It is to such serious cases that the 
medical faculty should turn their attention, and if possible 
find a cure to be made public. I have already stated the benefits 
to be derived from perspiration and sal volatile; since I wrote 
that I have had to deal with several serious cases, in which the 
patients swelled up in but a few seconds after the sting, breath¬ 
ing with great difficulty, and were otherwise seriously ill. In 
both cases while inducing the patient to perspire, camphorated 
oil was applied with friction to the chest and throat, which gave 
immediate relief. If such a thing as a cure could be discovered 
it would prevent hysteria in some, and encourage many to keep 
bees who do not by labouring under the terror that a sting might 
cause death. 
TAKING BEES TO THE MOORS. 
I have just returned after a successful fifty-miles journey 
with my bees to the moors, and am able to report on the pro¬ 
spects. Not only do the grouse look strong, plentiful, and 
bealthy, but the Heather is both earlier than usual and is very 
promising, so that there is game for the sportsman and honey 
for the bee keeper if but two weeks of fine weather occur during 
this month. All our hives being full in the body, supers will be 
taken at once. As matters stand we anticipate a large harvest. 
For nearly a week before leaving the weather was delightful, 
honey was carried in in abundance, which with so much newly 
gathered honey made it very risky to move bees, but by depriv¬ 
ing them of all filled and partly filled supers and givdng ample 
ventilation both above and below, I had not a single mishap. 
Should the weather keep fine for one week I shall require to visit 
them with a supply of empty su])ers, as the single cover with 
such strong hives will be full. Owing to the early deposition of 
nearly all our old queens I was not put to the trouble of joining 
young ones at this season; but as 1 have some young ones in 
nuclei in reserve will depose the queens that have bred most 
during the summer, and join these young ones after they are 
brought home. 
As f have most faith in those hives on theStewarton principle 
giving most supers, I shall add a second or third super on the 
top of all whenever the under supers are well begun, and if I 
had had body boxes filled with combi would have given a fourth 
one underneath. This would give the bees ample store room for 
as much honey as would fill a super after honey-gathering 
ceased, which is only successfully done with hives on the Stew- 
arton system, and is one of the ways to utilise combs and bees 
at the proper season with the greatest advantage to the bee¬ 
keeper. 
I am pleased to see and hear of so many bee-keepers exercis¬ 
ing their own judgment in apiculture, putting to test the different 
hives and systems, and I hope bees as well, This carried out in 
a spirited manner will benefit both themselves and others more 
than volumes of desultory discussion. As the honey season will 
soon be over, bee-keepers who have been troubled with brood in 
the supers should take the first advantage to have their hives 
made larger in the breeding compartment for another year, as 
small hives cause brojd in supers, and are never remune¬ 
rative. The bee keeper should initiate himself to the require¬ 
ments of the bee more than making a change from one kind of 
hive to another, which is not always profitable.—A Lanarkshire 
Bee-keeper. 
DRIVEN BEES. 
I HAVE always been fortunate enough to secure a good supply of 
driven bees for the trouble of driving them for the cottagers in my 
neighbourhood, and I thought perhaps the plan I adopt in uniting them 
might be of service to your querist Mr. John Bulbeck on page 107. Having 
ascertained how many stocks I have to drive, I open one or more of my 
bar-frame hives and shake off all the bees from three of the frames from 
each stock. These I place into a hive—frequently a makeshift or swarm 
box—and put my driven bees on to these three frames, and stand them 
as close as possible to the stock in bar-frame hive to which I wish to 
unite them, I then feed both the stock in the bar-frame hive and the 
driven bees on the three frames with scented syrup for a couple of days. 
I then smoke both lots, and having removed the queen that I consider 
the least value I lift the three frames with the driven bees adhering 
back into their original position, and having shaken the few bees out of 
the swarm box or makeshift hive, remove it, and, unless the stock is 
short of food, discontinue feeding. I may add I have proved this for 
four seasons without a single failure, which I cannot say of any other plan 
that 1 have tried, and hope it may be of service to many of vour readers. 
—J. P. S. 
LIGURIANISING. 
The following extracts, taken from a letter which I have just received 
from a correspondent whom I have known as one of the most successful 
apiarians of the day, may not be without value to the apiarian readers of 
this Journal who intend ligurianising their apiiries. The facts speak for 
themselves, comment is superfluous.— Author of “ Bee-keeping, Pl.4.in 
AND Practical.” 
“ I have had a very poor summer indeed. I was foolish enough last 
autumn to be persuaded to italianise, which I am sorry to say was done. 
I have thirty-six stocks and swarms of Italians, and I don’t think I shall 
get as many pounds of section honey from all of them, and such a summer 
too. I have some blacks, and the contrast in super honey is amazing. , . . 
I intend to make blacks my bee for the future. ... I have often 
thought what a pity it is that some of our authorities puff the Italian bee 
so much. I have proved that they are not to be compared to the English 
bee, and you can manipulate the English so much better. , . . Some 
Italian bees I have are the fiercest I ever had to deal with ; they can be 
smoked as much as you like, but they will sting.” 
EXTRACTING HONEY AND MAKING WAX. 
Will you kindly tell me how to separate the honey from the comb, 
and how to make the comb into wax ; indeed, how to manage the whole 
thing, and greatly oblige ? I am quite a stranger to bees. — Anne. 
[■' Anne ” wishes to know how to separate honey from the combs and 
how to make the combs into wax. With fine samples of comb from the 
body of hive and supers, rejecting all pieces containing pollen or brood, 
take a knife dipped in warm water and uncap every cell, first the one 
side then the other. If the honey is very thick, as is the case this year, 
to insure the entire dripping the combs may require shaving down to the 
midrib. Combs and honey are allowed to drop into a basket suspended 
between two chairs, or from the ceiling, having a muslin bag c.arried 
round the basket so as to catch all the drip, terminating in a point from 
which the honey dropi into a vessel beneath. Avoid much handling or 
squeezing the combs with the hands. In oldish combs where the honey 
is thicker the honey does not so readily part from the combs as in the 
more delicate ones from supers ; with such a screw press with very narrow 
perforated cylinders is good, in which the combs are first pressed with a 
rammer, then when full placed under the screw almost every drop of 
honey is pressed out in all its purity. A capital drainer for honey as well 
as for other things required for domestic use, and what I use, is a wooden 
case containing cylindrical bra«s wire sieves of different mesh, through 
which the honey, after it has been poured into the uppermost one, parses 
from the one to the other until it drops into a muslin or peaked net bag, 
then from it into a jar. These sieves do not clog up, neither do they over¬ 
flow, are cleanly, and obviate the soiling of many dishes. 
When the honey is all extracted the combs may be steeped in clean 
water, then washed to separate the remaining honey, which may be either 
made into mead or beer. The combs are now ready to be “ made into 
wax,” or, rather, the combs are in a state for separating the wax from the 
other dross. This is done by heat, which, I may add, destroys some of 
the properties of wax, rendering it brittle. When there are very little 
combs, not more than that from two or three hives, and a fine sample 
wanted, I put these into a tin inside another, both having a sufficient 
quantity of water placed upon the fire until all the combs are softened 
and ready to melt. I then place a perforated piston or dish on the top 
