Wisconsin State Agricultural Society. 
291 
and all who use the Melipulte testify that three pounds can be 
obtained where only one can be had in the ordinary way. If the 
bee had not such a formidable weapon, both of offense and defense, 
multitudes who now fear it might easily be induced to enter upon 
its cultivation; but the science teaches us laws by which all neces¬ 
sary operations may be performed without incurring any risk of ex¬ 
citing its anger while removing comb covered with bees, forming 
new swarms, exhibiting the queen, transferring them and their stores 
to other hives and extracting the honey, and thus enjoying the 
pleasure and profit of a pursuit which has been appropriately styled 
the poetry of rural economy. The laws are only three: 
First. The honey-bee, when filled with honey, never volunteers 
an attack, but only acts on the defensive. 
Second. They cannot under any circumstances resist the temp¬ 
tation to fill themselves with liquid sweets. 
Third. When frightened, they immediately begin to fill them¬ 
selves with honey from their combs. By blowing upon them 
smoke, it will always frighten them so that the largest and most 
fiery colony may at once be brought into complete subjection. 
In this consists all the secrets, charms, and receipts for taming 
bees with which unprincipled venders have long humbugged a too 
credulous public. The soul of this system is a complete control of 
the combs. With gentle movements and a thorough knowledge of 
the science, any one, male or female, can superintend a large apiary, 
performing every operation necessary for pleasure and profit with 
as little risk of stings as must be incurred in managing a single 
hive in the ordinary way. The eggs of the queen are deposited 
equally on each side of the comb, to economize heat for developing 
the brood, seventy degrees of Farenlieit being required. It requires 
twenty-four days to perfect the drones, twenty-one days to perfect 
workers, thirty-six hours of which it occupies in spinning its cot 
coon; and sixteen days to perfect a queen, twenty-four hours of 
which time it occupies in spinning its cocoon. Such is the enmi¬ 
ty of young queens to each other that the one that first emerges 
from the cell rushes to those of its sisters and tears to pieces even 
the imperfect larvae. There are five peculiarities of queens: 
1st. She arrives at maturity almost one-third sooner than a 
drone, and just one-third sooner than a worker. 
2d. Her organs of reproduction are completely developed. 
