colony, with one end faftened to the landing place, and knock them out upon it: they will foon crawl up the cloth, and join their fellows, who will gladly re ceive them.

a hive and a box: at night, place them in the bee-house, one over the other; and with a knife and a little lime and hair, stop close the mouth of the hive or upper box, fo that not a bee may be able to go in or out but at the front-door. This done, you will in a week or ten days with pleasure fee the combs appear in the boxes; but if it be an hive, nothing can be feen till the bees have wrought down into the box. Never plant a colony with a fingle fwarm, as Mr Thorley fays he has fometimes done, but with little fuccefs.

When the fecond box, or the box under the hive, appears full of bees and combs, it is time to raise your colony. This should be done in the dusk of the evening, and in the following manner.

Place your empty box, with the fliding fhutter drawn back, behind the house, near the colony that is to be raised, and at nearly the height of the floor: then lifting up the colony with what expedition you can, let the empty box be put in the place where it is to ftand, and the colony upon it; and fhut up the mouth of the then upper box with lime and hair, as before directed.

When, by the help of the windows in the back of the boxes, you find the middle box full of combs, and a quantity of honey fealed up in it, the lowest box half full of combs, and few bees in the uppermoft box, proceed thus.

About five o'clock in the afternoon, drive clofe with a mallet the fliding fhutter under the hive or box that is to be taken from the colony. If the combs are new, the fhutter may be forced home without a mallet; but be fure it be close, that no bees may afcend into the hive or box to be removed. After this, fhut close the doors of your house, and leave the bees thus cut off from the rest of their companions, for the space of half an hour or more. In this space of time, having loft their queen, they will fill themselves with honey, and be impatient to be fet at liberty.

If, in this interval, you examine the box or boxes beneath, and obferve all to be quiet in them, you may be confident that the queen is there, and in fafety. Hereupon raise the back part of the hive or box fo far, by a piece of wood flipped under it, as to give the prifoners room to come out, and they will return to their fellows then lifting the box from off the colony, and turning its bottom upmoft, cover it with a cloth all night; and the next morning, when this cloth is removed, the bees that have remained in it will return to the colony. Thus you have a hive or box of honey, and all your bees fafe.

If the bees do not all come out in this manner, Dr Warder's method may be followed, especially if it be with a hive. It is to place the hive with the small end downward in a pail, peck, or flower-pot, fo as to make it ftand firm; then to take an empty hive, and fet it upon the former, and to draw a cloth tight round the joining of the two hives, fo that none of the bees may be able to get out: after this, to ftrike the full hive fo fmartly as to disturb the bees that are in it, but with fuch paufes between the ftrokes as to allow them time to afcend into the empty hive, which must be held fast whilft this is doing, left it fall off by the fhaking of the other. When you perceive by the noife of the bees in the upper hive, that they are got into this laft, earry it to a cloth spread for this purpofe before the

Mr Thorley next gives an account of his narcotic, and of the manner of using it.

The method which he has purfued with great fuccefs for many years, and which he recommends to the public as the most effectual for preferving bees in common hives, is incorporation, or uniting two ftocks into one, by the help of a peculiar fume or opiate, which will put them entirely in your power for a time to divide and difpofe of at pleasure. But as that dominiou over them will be of fhort duration, you must be expeditious in this bufinefs.

The queen is immediately to be fearched for, and killed. Hives which have fwarmed twice, and are confequently reduced in their numbers, are the fittest to be joined together, as this will greatly ftrengthen and improve them. If a hive which you would take is both rich in honey and full of bees, it is but dividing the bees into two parts, and putting them into two. boxes inftead of one. Examine whether the stock to which you intend to join the bees of another, have ho ney enough in it to maintain the bees of both: it should weigh full 20 pounds.

The narcotic, or ftupifying fume, is made with the fungus maximus or pulverulentus, the large mushroom, commonly known by the name of bunt, puckfift, or frog-cheefe. It is as big as a man's head, or bigger: when ripe; it is of a brown colour, turns to powder, and is exceeding light. Put one of thefe pucks into a large paper, prefs it therein to two-thirds or near half the bulk of its former fize, and tie it up very close; then put it into an oven fome time after the household bread has been drawn, and let it remain there all night: when it is dry enough to hold fire, it is fit for ufe. The manner of ufing it is thus:

Cut off a piece of the puck, as large as a hen's egg, and fix it in the end of a small flick flit for that purpose, and fharpened at the other end; which place fo that the puck may hang near the middle of an empty hive. This hive must be fet with the mouth upward, in a pail or bucket which should hold it fteady, near the stock you intend to take. This done, fet fire to the puck, and immediately place the ftock of bees over it, tying a cloth round the hives, that no fmoke may come forth. In a minute's time, or little more, you will hear the bees fall like drops of hail into the empty hive. You may then beat the top of the full hive gently with your hand, to get out as many of them as you can: after this, loofing the cloth, lift the hive off to a table, knock it feveral times against the table, several more bees will tumble out, and perhaps the queen among them. She often is one of the last that falls. If the is not there, fearch for her among the main body in the empty hive, spreading them for this purpose on a table.

You must proceed in the fame manner with the other hive, with the bees of which thefe are to be united. One of the queens being fecured, you must put the bees of both hives together, mingle them thoroughly, and drop them among the combs of the hive which they are intended to inhabit. When they are all in, cover it with a packing or other coarse cloth which will

Bee.

34

admit air, and let them remain fhut up all that night and the next day. You will foon be sensible that they are awaked from this fleep.

The fecond night after their union, in the dufk of the evening, gently remove the cloth from off the mouth of the hive (taking care of yourfelf), and the bees will immediately fally forth with a great noife; but being too late, they will foon return: then inferting two pieces of tobacco-pipes to let in air, keep them confined for three or four days, after which the door may be left open.

The best time for uniting bees is, after their young brood are all out, and before they begin to lodge in the empty cells. As to the hour of the day, he advifes young practitioners to do it early in the afternoon, in order that having the longer light, they may the more eafily find out the queen. He never knew fuch combined stocks conquered by robbers. They will either swarm in the next fummer, or yield an hive full of honey. Glaf-hives. Mr N. Thornley, fon of the abovementioned clergyman, has added to the edition which he has given of his father's book, a poftfcript, purporting, that perfons who choose to keep bees in glafs-hives may, after uncovering the hole at the top of a flat-topped ftraw-hive, or box, place the glafs over it fo clofe that no bee can go in or out but at the bottom of the hive or box. The glafs-hive must be covered with an empty hive or with a cloth, that too much light may not prevent the bees from working. As foon as they have filled the ftraw-hive or box, they will begin to work up into the glas-hive. He tells us, that he himself has had one of thefe glafs-hives filled by the bees in 30 days in a fine feafon; and that it contained 38 pounds of fine honey. When the glass is completely filled, flide a tin-plate between it and the hive or box, fo as to cover the paffage, and in half an hour the glafs may be taken off with fafety. What few bees remain in it, will readily go to their companions. He has added a glafs win-" dow to his straw-hives, in order to fee what progress bees make; which is of fome importance, especially if one hive is to be taken away whilst the feafon ftill continues favourable for their collecting of honey: for when the combs are filled with honey, the cells are fealed up, and the bees forfake them, and refide moftly in the hive in which their works are chiefly carried on. Obferving also that the bees were apt to extend their combs thro' the paffage of communication in the upper hive, whether glafs or other, which rendered it neceffary to divide the comb when the upper hive was taken away, he now puts in that paffage a wire fcreen or netting, the meshes of which are large enough for a loaded bee to go easily through them. This prevents the joining of the combs from one box to the other, and confequently obviates the neceffity of cutting them, and of fpilling fome of the honey, which running down among Pl. XCVII.a crowd of bees, ufed before to incommode them much, it being difficult for them to clear their wings of it. Fig. 2. is a drawing of one of his colonies.

35

Of bees in

2. The reverend Mr White informs us, that his boxes, and fondness for these little animals foon put upon him enmethod of deavouring if poffible to fave them from fire and brim. taking their Stone; that he thought he had reafon to be content to fhare their labours for the prefent, and great reafon to

waz,

rejoice if he could at any time preferve their lives, to work for him another year; and that the main drift of his obfervations and experiments has therefore been, to difcover an eafy and cheap method, fuited to the abilities of the common people, of taking away fo much honey as can be fpared, without deftroying or ftarving the bees; and by the fame means to encourage feafonable fwarms.

In his directions how to make the bee-boxes of his inventing, he tells us, fpeaking of the manner of conftructing a fingle one, that it may be made of deal or any other well-feafoned boards which are not apt to warp or fplit. The boards fhould be near an inch thick; the figure of the box fquare, and its heigth and breadth nine inches and five eighths, every way meafuring within. With thefe dimenfions it will contain near a peck and an half. The front-part muft have a door cut in the middle of the bottom-edge, three inches wide, and near half an inch in height, which will give free liberty to the bees to pass through, yet not be large enough for their enemy the moufe to enter. In the back-part you muft cut a hole with a rabbet in it, in which you are to fix a pane of the clearest and best crown-glass, about five inches in length and three in breadth, and faften it with putty: let the top of the glafs be placed as high as the roof within-fide, that you may fee the upper part of the combs, where the bees with their riches are moftly placed. You will by this means be better able to judge of their ftate and ftrength, than if your glafs was fixed in the middle. The glafs must be covered with a thin piece of board, by way of shutter, which may be made to hang by a string, or turn upon a nail, or flide fideways between two mouldings. Such as are defirous of feeing more of the bees works, may make the glafs as large as the box will admit without weakening it too much; or they may add a pane of glafs on the top, which muft likewife be covered with a fhutter, fattened down with pegs, to prevent accidents.

The fide of the box which is to be joined to another x of the fame form and dimenfions, as it will not be expofed to the internal air, may be made of a piece of flit deal not half an inch thick. This he calls the fide of communication, because it is not to be wholly inclofed: a space is to be left at the bottom the whole breadth of the box, and a little more than an inch in height; and a hole or paffage is to be made at top, three inches long, and more than half an inch wide. Through thefe the bees are to have a communication from one box to the other. The lower communication being on the floor, our labourers, with their burdens, may readily and eafily afcend into either of the boxes. The upper communication is only intended as a paffage between the boxes, refembling the little holes or narrow paffes which may be obferved in the combs formed by our fagacious architects, to fave time and fhorten the way when they have occafion to pass from one comb to another; juft as in populous cities, there are narrow lanes and alleys paffing tranfverfely from one large ftreet to another.

In the next place you are to provide a loose board, half an inch thick, and large enough to cover the fide where you have made the communications. You are likewife to have in readiness feveral little iron staples,

S 2

an

an inch and half long, with the two points or ends bended down more than half an inch. The use of these will be feen prefently.

You have now only to fix two flicks croffing the box from fide to fide, and croffing each other, to be a flay to the combs; one about three inches from the bottom, the other the fame diftance from the top; and when you have painted the whole, to make it more durable, your box is finished.

The judicious bee-matter will here observe, that the form of the box now defcribed is as plain as poffible for it to be. It is little more than five fquare pieces of board nailed together; fo that a poor cottager who has but ingenuity enough to faw a board into the given dimenfions, and to drive a nail, may make his own boxes well enough, without the help or expence of a carpenter.

No directions are neceffary for making the other box,

which must be of the fame form and dimenfions. The two boxes differ from each other only in this, that the fide of communication of the one muit be on your right hand; of the other, on your left. Fig. 3. reprefents two of thefe boxes, with their openings of communiçation, ready to join to each other.

Mr White's manner of hiving a fwarm into one or both of these boxes is thus:

You are to take the loose board, and faften it to one of the boxes, fo as to ftop the communications. This may be done by three of the ftaples before mentioned; one on the top of the box near the front; the two others on the back, near the top and near the bottom. Let one end of the ftaple be thrust into a gimlet-hole made in the box, fo that the other end may go as tight as can be over the loose board, to keep it from flipping when it is handled. The next morning, after the bees have been hived in this box, the other box fhould be added, and the loofe board fhould be taken away. This will prevent a great deal of labour to the bees, and fome to the proprietor.

Be careful to faten the fhutter fo clofe to the glass, that no light may enter through it; for the bees feem to look upon fuch light as a hole or breach in their houfe, and on that account may not fo well like their new habitation. But the principal thing to be obferved at this time is, to cover the box as foon as the bees are hived with a linen cloth thrown clofely over it, or with green boughs to protect it from the piercing heat of the fun. Boxes will admit the heat much fooner than ftraw-hives; and if the bees find their house too hot for them, they will be wife enough to leave it. If the fwarm be larger than ufual, inftead of faftening the loofe board to one box, you may join two boxes toge ther with three ftaples, leaving the communication open from one to the other, and then hive your bees into both. In all other refpects, they are to be hived in boxes after the fame manner as in common hives.

The door of the fecond box fhould be carefully ftopped up, and be kept conftantly closed, in order that the bees may not have an entrance but through the firft box.

When the boxes are fet in the places where they are to remain, they must be screened from the fummer's fun, because the wood will otherwise be heated to a greater degree than either the bees or their works can bear; and they fhould likewife be fcreened from the

winter's fun, because the warmth of this will draw the bees from that lethargic state which is natural to them, as well as many other infects in the winter-feafon. For this purpose, and alfo to fhelter the boxes from rain, our ingenious clergyman has contrived the following frame.

Fig. 4. reprefents the front of a frame for twelve colonies. a, a, are two cells of oak lying flat on the ground, more than four feet long. In thefe cells are fixed four oaken pofts, about the thickness of fuch as are used for drying linen The two pofts b, b, in the front, are about fix feet two inches above the cells: the other two, flanding backward, five feet eight inches. You are next to nail fome boards of flit deal horizontally from one of the fore-pofts to the other, to fcreen the bees from the fun. Let thefe boards be feven feet feven inches in length, and nailed to the infide of the pofts; and be well feafoned, that they may not shrink or gape in the joints. c, c, Are two fplints of deal, to keep the boards even, and ftrengthen them.

Fig. 5. reprefents the back of the frame. d, d, d, d, Are four ftrong boards of the fame length with the frame, on which you are to place the boxes. Let the upper fide of them be very fmooth and even, that the boxes may ftand true upon them: or it may be ftill more advisable, to place under every pair of boxes a fmooth thin board, as long as the boxes, and about a quarter of an inch wider. The bees will foon faften the boxes to this board in fuch manner that you may move or weigh the boxes and board together, without breaking the wax or refin, which for many reafons ought to be avoided. These floors must be supported by pieces of wood or bearers, which are nailed from poft to poft at each end. They are likewise to be well nailed to the frame, to keep them from finking with the weight of the boxes. f Represents the roof, which projects backward about feven or eight inches beyond the boxes, to fhelter them from rain. You have now only to cut niches or holes in the frame, over against cach mouth or entrance into the boxes, at h, h, h, in fig. 4. Let thefe niches be near four inches long; and under each you must nail a small piece of wood for the bees to alight upon. The morning or evening fun will fhine upon one or both ends of the frame, let its afpect be what it will: but you may prevent its over-heating the boxes, by a loofe board fet up between the pofts, and kept in by two or three pegs.

The fame gentleman, with great humanity, obferves, that no true lover of bees ever lighted the fatal match without much concern; and that it is evidently more to our advantage, to fpare the lives of our bees, and. be content with part of their ftores, than to kill and. take poffeffion of the whole.

About the latter end of Auguft, fays he, by a little infpection through your glaffes, you may eafily difcover which of your colonies you may lay under contribution. Such as have filled a box and an half with. their works, will pretty readily yield you the half box.. But you are not to depend upon the quantity of combs without examining how they are ftored with honey.. The bees fhould, according to him, have eight or nine pounds left them, by way of wages for their fummer's work.

The moft proper time for this bufinefs is the middle of the day; and as you ftand behind the frame, you

Bee. will need no armour, except a pair of gloves. The operation itself is very fimple, and eafily performed, thus: Open the mouth of the box you intend to take; then with a thin knife cut through the refin with which the bees have joined the boxes to each other, till you find that you have separated them; and after this, thruft a fheet of tin gently in between the boxes. The communication being hereby ftopped, the bees in the fullest box, where it is most likely the queen is, will be a little disturbed at the operation; but thofe in the other box where we fuppofe the queen is not, will run to and fro in the utmost hurry and confufion, and fend forth a mournful cry, eafily diftinguished from their other notes. They will iffue out at the newly opened door; not in a body as when they fwarm, nor with fuch calm and cheerful activity as when they go forth to their labours; but by one or two at a time, with a wild flutter and vifible rage and diforder. This, however, is foon over: for as foon as they get abroad and fpy their fellows, they fly to them inftantly and join them at the mouth of the other box. By this means, in an hour or two, for they go out flowly, you will have a box of pure honey, without leaving a bee in it to moleft you; and likewife without dead bees, which, when you burn them, are often mixed with your honey, and both wafte and damage it.

Mr White acknowledges, that he has fometimes found this method fail, when the mouth of the box to be taken away has not been conftantly and carefully closed: the bees will in this cafe get acquainted with it as an entrance; and when you open the mouth in order to their leaving this box, many of them will be apt to return, and the communication being stopped. will in a fhort time carry away all the honey from this to the other box; fo much do they abhor a feparation. When this happens, he has recourfe to the following expedient, which he thinks infallible. He takes a piece of deal, a little larger than will cover the mouth of the box, and cuts in it a fquare nich fomewhat more than half an inch wide. In this nich he hangs a little trap-door, made of a thin piece of tin, turning upon a pin, with another pin croffing the nich a little lower fo as to prevent the hanging door from opening both ways. This being placed clofe to the mouth, the bees which want to get out will eafily thruft open the door outwards, but cannot open it the other way to get in again; fo muft, and will readily, make to the other box, leaving this in about the space of two hours, with all its flore, justly due to the tender hearted bee-mafter as a ranfom for their lives.

What, led Mr White to prefer collateral boxes to thofe before in ufe, was, to ufe his own words, his "compaffion for the poor bees, who, after traverfing the fields, return home weary and heavy laden, and muft perhaps depofite their burden up two pair of flairs, or in the garret. The lower room, it is likely, is not yet furnished with ftairs: for, as is well known, our little architects lay the foundation of their ftructures at the top, and build downward. In this cafe, the weary little labourer is to drag her load up the fides of the walls: and when she has done this, the will travel many times backward and forward, as I have frequently feen, along the roof, before fhe finds the door or paffage into the fecond ftory; and here again fhe is perplexed with a like puzzling labyrinth, before the

gets into the third. What a waste is here of that precious time which our bees value fo much, and which they employ fo well! and what an expence of strength and fpirits, on which their fupport and fuftenance depend! In the collateral boxes, the rooms are all on the ground-flour; and because I know my bees are wife enough to value convenience more than state, I have made them of fuch a moderate, though decent, height, that the bees have much lefs way to climb to the top of them than they have to the crown of a common hive."

Bee

of bees in

36 Mr Wildman's hives have been already defcribed Of the ma(n° 23, 24.) A good fwarm will foon fill one of thefe nagement hives, and therefore another live may be put under it M: Wildthe next morning. The larger fpace allowed the bees man's hives. will excite their industry in filling them with combs. The queen will lay fome eggs in the upper hive; but fo foon as the lower hive is filled with combs, fhe will lay moft of them in it. In little more than three weeks, all the eggs laid in the upper hive will be turned into bees; and if the feafon is favourable, their cells will be foon filled with honey.

As foon as they want room, a third hive fhould be placed under the two former; and in a few days after the end of three weeks from the time the fwarm was put into the hive, the top hive may be taken away at noon of a fair day; and if any bees remain in it, carry it to a little dillance from the ftand, and turning its bottom up, and striking it on the fides, the bees will be alarmed, take wing, and join their companions in the fecond and third hives. If it is found that the bees are very unwilling to quit it, it is probable that the queen remains among them. In this cafe, the bees must be treated in the manner that fhall be directed when we deferibe Mr Wildman's method of taking the honey and the wax. The upper hive now taken away fhould be put in a cool place, in which no vermin, mice, &c. can come at the combs, or other damage can happen to them, and be thus preferved in reserve.

When the hives feem to be again crowded, and the upper hive is well ftored or filled with honey, a fourth hive fhould be placed under the third, and the upper hive be taken off the next fair day at noon, and treated as already directed. As the honey made during the fummer is the beft, and as it is needless to keep many full hives in ftore, the honey may be taken out of the combs of this fecond hive for ufe.

If the feafon is very favourable, the bees may ftill fill a third hive. In this cafe, a fifth hive must be put under the fourth, and the third taken away as before. The bees will then fill the fourth for their winter store.

As the honey of the firft hive is better than the honey collected fo late as that in the third, the honey may be taken out of the combs of the firft, and the third may be preferved with the fame care as directed for that.

In the month of September, the top hive fhould be examined: if full, it will be a fufficient provifion for the winter; but if light, that is, not containing 20 pounds of honey, the more the better, then, in the month of October, the fifth hive fhould be taken away, and the hive kept in reserve should be put upon the remaining one, to fupply the bees with abundant provi fions for the winter. Nor need the owner grudge them this ample ftore; for they are faithful ftewards, and

will