116 
THE HIVE AND HONEY-BEE. 
as they can. Numerous experiments to compel bees to 
work in observing-hives exposed to the full light of day, 
from the moment they were hived, instead of keeping 
them, as I now do, in darkness for several days, have 
made me quite familiar with all such do-nothing pro¬ 
ceedings before their departure. 
Bees sometimes abandon their hives very early in 
Spring, or late in Summer or Fall. Although exhibiting 
the appearance of natural swarming, they leave, not be¬ 
cause the population is so crowded that they wish to 
form new colonies, but because it is either so small, or the 
hive so destitute of supplies, that they are driven to des¬ 
peration. Seeming to have a presentiment that they must 
perish if they stay, instead of awaiting the sure approach 
of famine, they sally out to see if they cannot better their 
condition. I have known a starving colony to leave their 
hive on a Spring-like day in December. 
It may seem strange that the instincts of so provident 
an insect should not always impel it to select a suitable 
domicile before venturing to abandon the old home ; since 
often, before they are housed again, they are exposed to 
powerful winds and drenching rains, which beat down 
and destroy many of their number. 
I solve this bee-problem, like many others, by consider¬ 
ing how the present arrangement conduces to the advan¬ 
tage of man. 
Bees would have been of little service to him, if, instead 
of tarrying till he had time to hive them, their instincts 
had impelled them to decamp, without delay, from the 
restraints of domestication. In this, as in many other 
things, we see that what on a superficial view seemed an 
obvious imperfection, proves, on closer examination, to be 
a special contrivance to answer important ends. 
To return to our new swarm. The queen sometimes 
