5$- chapman’s handy-book. 
are wrapped up in white paper, and carefully packed away 
or put a number of them together m a box. It is one of 
the best specimens of New Zealand produce with which to 
surprise and please our friends at home. But it affects 
what I am now telling you about running your honey m 
this way. It is difficult, nay, impossible, to get it from the 
impure combs by any of the ordinary methods ; it will 
not run—pressure is equally useless. 
An d now for the second article of bee produce-— the wax. 
It is by far the most valuable of the two : for this reason 
—because there will be an unlimited demand for it 1 
have spoken of honey and wax, the produce ol bees m t leir 
first and simple forms. The bleached wax of commerce 
is easily prepared by increasing the surface ot the . wax, 
and then exposing it to the action oi sun and air. A simp e 
way of bleaching wax in small quantities is to run it into 
cakes in the usual way, and then bicach as beioic ; v)j 1 ^ 
careful not to overheat your wax, or you will spoil its 
colour, and deprive it of many of its useful qualities. 
The uses of wax for domestic purposes, and in the arts, 
are various and extensive. The greater portion of that 
imported into England is used perhaps in candles. But I 
have already said that I hope the day may come when 
wax candles of our own make will take the place of dips. 
But there are many smaller articles which a careful house¬ 
keeper will like to have at hand, to say nothing of the 
pleasure of sewing with a well waxed thread. Lip salve 
and cerate are no bad things to have in the house —the 
latter is made by melting an ounce of wax, and heating an 
ounce of sweet oil, not boiling either. Pour them together 
at the same temperature, and keep stirring steadily until 
they leave the fluid for the buttery state. If you leave off 
stirring just at the setting point, the wax and oil will 
separate, and you will have to melt again. But if you 
stir steadily all the time, you will have a substance soft as 
butter and smooth as oil—of such excellent healing powers, 
that I have sometimes wished to have a sore place to test 
its virtues. The cerate may be made harder or softer by 
altering the proportion of oil to the wax. 
The softer cerate is best for dressing a blister; nothing 
