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THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, June 15, 1858. 
EARLY SWARMS. 
I had two swarms of bees on the 15th of May, two on the 
20th, one on the 24th, and one on the 31st,—four swarms out 
of five most excellent. The two on the 15th have filled the 
hives, and are working in the glasses. I do not consider I 
live in a good district for bees; but I fed my stocks all through 
last October on sugar and honey. I sign my name for your 
satisfaction.—C. Y., Eton, Windsor. 
We have had seven swarms up to this date (June 5), viz., 
one 20tli of May, one 25th, one 29th, one 31st, one 1st June, 
j and two 5th. Now, if the old adage be true, that 
“ A swarm of bees in May 
Is worth a load of hay,” 
1 surely we shall be all right with our bees this season; and, 
certainly, I never saw such large swarms, nor yet finer bees. 
—Jno. Beekins, The Gardens, Thornham Hall , Suffolk. 
I nAYE just bought of a cottager, near here (Ewell, Surrey), 
a hive of bees, which swarmed the 21st of May (it was a bright 
and beautiful day), and they appear strong and active. Tie 
is an old bee-keeper, and sticks to the old hive, and the 
| smothering process. I am a novice in bee-keeping, and recoil 
from the contemplation of this barbarous practice. “ Better 
! kill them at once than starve them, which you do if you take 
away their food,” he says. And if that is unanswerable, I 
confess I should think so too. My bees have a good billet , 
and all their own way. I should be obliged by any advice 
how to systematise them. Improve then’ education, if you 
please, but not in “ fancy hives,” which, like much that I 
•! observe elsewhere, makes them above their business. Where 
can “Payne’s improved cottage hive” be seen? and “Teget- 
meier’s cheap wooden box?” I want something that honest 
bees may live in, and pay their way, without being either 
smothered or starved when I call for the rent. — Redolentque 
Thymq. 
[Can any of our Suffolk correspondents say where Payne’s 
hives can be obtained ? They were made near Bury St. Ed¬ 
munds. Tegetmeier’s hives may be seen at his residence, 
1 Muswell Hill, near London.—E d.] 
ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY’S MEETING. 
The May meeting of the Entomological Society was held 
under the Presidentship of Dr. J. E. Gray, E.R.S., &c., and 
was very fully attended. Amongst the donations received 
since the last meeting were—The publications of the Royal 
Society of London, of the Royal Academy of Bavaria, and of 
the Imperial Society of Moscow ; the fine work on the 
Butterflies and Sphinges of India, and their transformations, 
recently published by Dr. Horsfield, under the authority of 
the East India Company, &c. 
Mr. Ianson exhibited a specimen of the bark of the Beech 
tree, infested to a very great extent by a species of Coccus , 
which emits a white exudation, something like that of the 
American blight. 
Mr. Evans exhibited the larva and perfect state of a species 
of Weevil, of the genus Tryporus, which had been found in- 
| fe3ting bulbs from the Cape of Good Hope. 
Mr. Francis exhibited various Coleoptera, recently captured 
in the neighbourhood of Folkstone. A number of rare 
species, belonging to the same order, and mostly new to this 
country, but generally of small size, were also exhibited by 
Messrs. Ianson and Waterhouse, and Dr. Power. 
The President communicated to the Society the result of 
the sale of the Society’s collection of exotic insects, which 
had taken place since the last meeting, and announced that 
the Council intended to apply the proceeds of the sale (which 
exceeded £300) to the purchase of British insects (to increase 
! the native collection forming by the Society), and in additions 
| to the library. It had been intended that all the typical 
specimens of species described by Mr. Ivirby should be re- 
; tained; but, as some of these were unfortunately without 
j labels, it had been impossible to identify them ; it is, there- 
1 fore, to be hoped, that, should any such be dicoverecl in the 
lots sold by auction, the purchasers will restore them to the 
Society. 
Mr. Samuel Stevens exhibited a number of splendid , 
Butterflies, recently collected in Amboyna by Mr. Wallace, j 
and which had been sent home, each being folded carefully in | 
a small piece of paper. 
Mr. Wailes exhibited a new British species of Micro- 
lepidoptera, closely allied to Cemiostoma Laburnella, which 
he had reared from Genista tinctoria. A conversation here¬ 
upon ensued, on the claim of this, and various other closely 
allied presumed new species of moths, to be considered as 
really distinct, and on the extent to which these species might | 
vary, owing to a different, although nearly allied, kind of 
plant having been eaten by the caterpillar. 
Dr. Gray complimented the Society on the appearance of 
the first part of the catalogue of British Coleoptera, recently 
published by Mr. Waterhouse, which would doubtless give a 
fresh impulse to the investigation of the insects of that order. 
Mr. F. Smith, of the British Museum, exhibited a specimen 
of the rare and remarkable Parasite Stylops melittce , which 
he had reared the same morning from the wild bee Andrena 
fuscata. Also the nest of a leaf-cutter Bee, which had been 
built within a piece of India-rubber tubing, the cells being j 
placed transversely. 
Captain Cox exhibited specimens of hop-poles, from Kent, 
greatly injured by the burrows of the larvae of one of the 
Longicorn beetles ( Cerambycidce —possibly Clytus arietis, or 
Tachyta collaris ). 
Mr. S. Stevens read some extracts from a letter, received 
from Mr. Bates, giving an account of the habits of the Bra¬ 
zilian Butterflies, belonging to the genera Pandora and 
Ageronia , which differ from those of all the other genera of 
Nymphalideous butterflies. A letter w r as also read from Mr. 
Wallace, commenting on the nomenclature of the large 
Butterflies forming the genus Ornithoptera, which led to a 
smart discussion on the rules of zoological nomenclature, in j 
which the President, and Messrs. Westwood, Waterhouse, 
and Lubbock took part. 
Dr. Hagen read descriptions of six new species of British 
Neuropterous insects, belonging to the genera Chloroperta, 
Isopteryx, Leuctra, and Nemoura. 
A note was read by Mr. Newman, on the habits of Scolylus 
destructor , in opposition to the memoir of Captain Cox on 
that subject, for which the gold medal had been awarded him 
by the Royal Botanical Society. 
A FEW NOTES ON WATERING. 
Rain can so confidently be expected at all times, in some 
situations, that out-door watering is very little required; in 
fact, an opposite evil is often run into, for fine dry weather is 
the exception, and frequent showers the rule. Be this as it j 
may, and be the evils and inconveniences of hand-watering ! 
ever so many, it must, nevertheless, be done to a certain i 
extent. 
Seed beds -of Lettuce, Endive, Cabbage, and other things : 
which must be sown at particular times, and these very often 
in dry and bright unclouded sunshine, must have a little 
moisture supplied, to enable the seeds to germinate; otherwise 
they either perish in the ground, are devoured by birds, or lie' 
dormant until quickened by rain, which may, very often, not 
come until it is too late for the plants to occupy the place they 
were intended for. But watering, even then, has its evils, 
which it is proper here to look into. 
In the first place it may be averred safely, that no watering j 
whatever, however skilfully done, can compare with that ! 
beneficial mode which nature adopts in moistening the earth, 1 
and washing the foliage of plants with copious showers of j 
rain. The latter evidently carries some gaseous, or acid, im¬ 
pregnation with it, which even rain water does not possess, 
when poured out, of the rose of a watering-pot. The condition 
of the atmosphere at this time has doubtless much to do with 
this : at all events, no hand watering is like rain. In many 
cases, it is impossible to obtain even rain water, for the purpose 
of out-door watering.* The inmates of a glasshouse generally 
claim attention first; and, when the tanks are getting low, 
out-door watering from them is forbidden, and recourse must 
be had to the pump, or other source of supply. Yery often this 
