180 
THE COTTAGE HARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, June 22, 1858. 
lights in a mixture of loam peat and lime rubbish, but it is 
not at all particular as to soil, and requires but little. To 
produce a good effect, you had better plant every three or 
four feet apart. Some of the species of Cissus , such as ant- 
arctica , or capensis , would cover the space quicker. But 
they are more rambling, and we question if they would stand 
the heat of the pipes equally well.] 
DRONE-RILLING IN JUNE. 
! 
“ Can you account for bees at this season killing their 
drones ? I have a strong stock, two years old, that showed 
every symptom of swarming during the last week in May, 
instead of which they commenced a wholesale slaughter of 
their drones about the 3d of June. The ground is sti’ewed 
with dead drones, and the work of destruction is still going 
on.” —A Beginner. 
[There is nothing very remarkable in the destruction of the 
drones in your stock-hive, which merely proves that one 
queen only exists, and, consequently, that no swarming is now 
meditated by the family. The drones have, therefore, no 
office left to fulfil, and the bees have sagacity enough to see 
the inutility of continuing to maintain a race of idle con¬ 
i’ sinners of wealth.] 
BEES FORSAKING TIIEIR HIYE. 
! 
“ On the 30th of May, at c pudding-time,’ a cry w r as raised, 
c the bees are swarming.’ As this was an event that had been 
anxiously looked for, the house was soon in a commotion, 
and the members of the household, emulating the bees, were 
| rushing to and fro. The pater rushed out to observe, the 
I mater seized a small bell, which some one had assured her 
was the thing to cause the bees to settle, and which, in spite 
of my superior knowledge, she would continue to tinkle j and 
! my youngest hope was despatched, with hot haste, for our 
I odd man, one cunning at hiving bees. Presently the sw r arm 
! settles on a furze bush, on a bit of waste close by. In antici¬ 
pation of this, I had made two boxes, on the Rev. C. White’s, 
Mr. Taylor’s, or Mr. Somebody Else’s plan—whoever in¬ 
vented the collateral hive. Into the largest of these boxes, 
the man shakes the bees, to my mind (ignorant as I am) 
somewhat roughly. However, they appeared to take to the 
box quietly ; and at night were put in the place of the stock, 
as advised by your ‘ Country Curate,’ the stock being re¬ 
moved to a stand close by. The advantage of this in increas¬ 
ing the numbers wa3 very perceptible on the Monday, when 
a great number of bees were observed entering the hive, with 
yellow pellets on their thighs. During Monday, they ap¬ 
peared to have remained quiet, and I was boasting about the 
i parish of the beautiful swarm I had got, and how well they 
were doing, and how much honey I should deprive them of 
shortly. 1 Vanity of vanities!’ I was at home on Tuesday, 
1 and early in the morning went to look at my swarm, and was 
sorry to find that many of the bees were idly hanging about 
the hive. At ten o’clock the air was again alive with bees ; 
in a few minutes every bee had left the box : they settled this 
time on a small red cedar. As I had seen the mode of hiv¬ 
ing, and my unfortunate man had one of his eyes closed, 
having been severely stung on the 30th, I decided upon 
hiving them myself. This I did quietly, and quickly putting 
them again into the box they had just left, again they seemed 
j to take quietly to it. Again I was disappointed ; for, be¬ 
tween three and four o’clock, they all left the box, and settled 
on a furze bush in the adjoining waste. By this time, it began 
to dawn upon me that there might be something objectionable 
to the bees in the box, and I felt reluctantly obliged to hive 
them in the old-fashioned straw skep. This I did in the best 
manner I could ; but, from the number of the bees and the 
awkwardness of the bush, I could not brush them all into the 
! hive, and was obliged to shake a second lot into a box. These 
I turned down beside the others, and shortly had the pleasure 
of seeing the two lots amalgamate, and draw quietly into the 
straw hive. I now congratulated myself upon having saved 
my bees, and escaped without a wound. 1 regretted that I 
| was obliged to leave home, and should not see the bees again 
i for several days. Six o’clock came,—the time 1 was to leave, 
| —when I went to take a last fond look at them. Imagine 
my disgust at finding one of my Raspberry canes bent down, 
and kept on the ground, by a large cluster of bees : whether 
they came from the lot I had hived, or from either of my i 
stocks (I have two), I have not the least idea. I had but 
time, as the lot was on the ground, to place the rejected box 
over them, and to leave word that when the man came he 
was to do the best he could. 
When I saw them again, I was pleased to find, that the 
first, or large lot, had been put in its place, and that the 
second, or small lot, had been hived in the box, and that both 
seemed working and doing well. Now I want to know the 
cause of all this trouble, and why one lot of bees would re¬ 
main in the box , and why one lot ivould not ? Did the man, 
in shaking them roughly at first, kill the queen ? If he did, 
why do they remain quiet, and appear to be busy working 
now ? I am ignorant of, but partial to, bees, and wish to 
keep them on the depriving, or non-killing system. I read 
ail your articles and a great many others, and, as far as theory 
goes, am pretty well up in the matter. I find, however, that 
theory is of very little value, when bees are obstinate, and 
will not be treated by rule of book. Guide me, if you can, 
for the future, and receive the thanks of your constant 
reader.”—J. C. / 
[Your swarm evidently took a dislike to the box into which 
you first hived it, as a family amongst ourselves sometimes 
does, on unconsciously removing to a house with bad drainage, 
or other nuisance. Possibly the smell of paint, or of some¬ 
thing else, was offensive ; but, in these cases of desertion, it is 
generally unwise to persevere in the use of the same box, and 
you did right in changing the hive. It may possibly have 
happened that the box into which you hived the swarm w r as 
not sufficiently protected from the influence of the sun, and so 
led to the evacuation of a residence otherwise unobjection¬ 
able. It ought to be borne in mind, that all w'ooden hives 
require to be securely shaded, or the interior degree of heat 
sometimes becomes insupportable in such weather as we have 
of late been favoured with, when the combs fall down in con¬ 
sequence. The second swarm, to which you allude, had clearly 
no connection with the first, but must either have proceeded 
from your other stock, or from some neighbouring apiary. It 
appears that this colony was not as fastidious as the first one, 
and retained possession of the rejected domicile. Possibly the 
source of the mischief had been in some degree remedied, or 
the box been partially cleared of offensive matter by its tem¬ 
porary tenants. Your suggestion, as to the probable loss of 
the queen, is negatived by the fact of the bees being at work. 
You must not be disheartened, if the course of your apiarian 
affairs does not all times run quite as smooth as you could 
wish, and no book knowledge, however desirable, can meet 
every supposeable awkward case in practice.] 
THE HISTORY AND LITERATURE OE 
BRITISH GARDENING. 
BY THE EDITORS. 
CHAP. I. 
EROM THE ARRIVAL OE THE ROMANS UNTIL THE NORMAN 
INVASION. 
(B.C. 55— A.D. 10G6.) 
When the conquering arms of Rome reached this 
almost Ultima Thule of their geography, they found i 
the barbarous inhabitants existing chiefly upon the 
produce of their herds, and of the chase, although not 
totally inattentive to the cultivation of the soil. The 
inland inhabitants, descended from the Cimbri, lived | 
in straw-thatched cottages, and knew nothing of hus¬ 
bandry ; they tilled no ground, and sowed no corn, but 
subsisted for the most part on milk and flesh (Ceos. 
Comm., lib. v., c. 14). But those who dwelt near the 
coast, and particularly on that part of it now known 
as Kent, Essex, Suffolk, and Norfolk, were acquainted 
with the treasures of the soil. From their intercourse 
with the Belgee, and the frequent visits of that people, j 
either for trade or plunder, the natives of the coasts I 
