hive-boats from place to place along the 
Nile according to the succession of 
flowers. The custom also prevails in 
Persia, Asia Minor and Greece. In 
Scotland the same method is used while 
the heather is in bloom and in Poland 
bees are transferred back and forth be- 
tween summer pastures and winter 
quarters. 
A few years ago a floating bee house 
was constructed on the Mississippi river 
large enough to carry two thousand 
colonies. It was designed to be towed 
up the river from Louisiana to Minne- 
sota, keeping pace with the blossoming 
of the flowers and then drop back down 
the river to the sunny South before cold 
weather should set in in the fall. 
Honey-bee ships have also been talked 
of which could carry bees to the West 
Indies to cruise for honey during the 
winter. 
tT The bee is not fastidious, but will 
live in any kind of clean box or barrel 
that may be provided for its use, hence 
it sometimes lives in queer places. A 
swarm escaping will generally make its 
home in a hollow tree or in a fissure of 
some large rock. The ancient English 
hives were generally made of baskets 
of unpeeled willow. Cork hives are in 
use in some parts of Europe, and 
earthenware hives are in use in 
Greece and Turkey. Glass hives are 
mentioned as far back as the year 
1665. In 1792 movable-comb hives 
were invented and in the century fol- 
lowing more than eight hundred patents 
were granted on hives in the United 
States. 
Bee products form an important item 
of income in the United States, more 
than two billion pounds of honey and 
wax being produced in a single season. 
When we consider that this appalling 
amount of sweetness is gathered a drop 
here and a drop there it leads us to 
figures too large to be comprehended. 
In considering the value of bees we 
must by no means think of honey as 
their sole product, as beeswax is an 
important article. After the honey has 
been extracted from the comb the lat- 
ter is mixed with water and boiled 
down and run into firm yellow cakes, 
from which the color disappears if ex- 
posed for a certain length of time to 
the air. Thin slices are exposed until 
thoroughly bleached, when it is again 
melted and run into cakes, and is then 
known as the white wax of commerce. 
Before oil lamps came into use large 
quantities of this white wax were used 
in the manufacture of candles, which 
made the best light then known, as 
they burned better than tallow candles 
and without the smoke or odor which 
made the tallow article objectionable. 
The advent of the oil-lamp, the gas 
jet, and the electric light have prac- 
tically disposed of its usefulness in 
that direction, except in devotional 
exercises, although colored tapers made 
of white wax are now used for decora- 
tive purposes, especially during the 
holiday season, when numbers of them 
are used to light our Christmas trees. 
White wax is also used extensively for 
making ornamental objects such as 
models of fruits and flowers. Whole 
plants are sometimes reproduced and 
models of various vegetable and ani- 
mal products are reproduced in colored 
wax and used for educational or mu- 
seum purposes. The anatomist finds 
it of great value in reproducing the 
normal and diseased structures of the 
human form. No doubt the original 
wax works of Mrs. Jarley, made famous 
by Dickens in "The Old Curiosity 
Shop," were a collection of wax images 
made from the product of the honey- 
bee. 
Metheglin is a drink made from 
honey, and is consumed largely in 
some parts of the world. It is the nectar 
which the ancient Scandinavian ex- 
pected to sip in paradise, using skulls 
of his enemies as goblets. 
The East Indies and the Philippine 
Islands seem to be under special obli- 
gations to astonish the world in every- 
thing, and in order to keep pace with 
their reputations have produced honey- 
bees of three sizes, one of which is the 
smallest honey-bee known, and an- 
other the largest. The smaller variety 
is so diminutive that one square inch of 
comb contains one hundred cells on 
each side; the entire comb, as it hangs 
from the twig of a small tree or bush, 
is only about the size of a man's hand. 
The workers are a little longer, but 
somewhat more slender than our com- 
ix 
