rags or strong brown paper may occasionally be used as substitutes; but they are so apt to blaze that no beekeeper who can find a piece of fustian will use them.

Chloroform or puff-ball may sometimes be used by experienced men to produce the complete prostration and stupor of a swarm-i.e., all the bees in a hive-for a short time; but the use of these things is dangerous and quite unnecessary.

CHAPTER XXII.

WHETHER IS THE SWARMING OR NON-SWARMING SYSTEM OF MANAGEMENT THE MOST PROFITABLE?

THIS question is of great importance, and will be considered as fully as our limits will permit. The swarming system of management is not only more profitable, but, taking a run of years, is better every way, and more natural, than the system that prevents swarming.

One bee-keeper in the neighbourhood of Manchester who writes on the subject, once said to me that “honey and swarms could not be obtained from hives in the same season." I venture to express a contrary opinion. Now, during the last three years my best swarms every year have risen in weight to 70 lb. each, and sometimes more, whereas his non-swarmers have not approached that weight -nay, my old stock-hives, after yielding one and two swarms each, have been as heavy as his, which never swarmed at all. All this has not been owing to their being allowed to swarm, but partly to the size of the hives and our system of management.

But after making many trials we can state that in good seasons for honey, a good early swarm will, at the end of the season, weigh more than a hive that has never been permitted to swarm at all. A swarm put into an empty hive is doubtless placed at a great disadvantage, and

apparently will never both fill its hive with combs and gather as much honey as the old one already full, weighing perhaps 30 lb. or 40 lb. But wait a little the swarm which is far behind during the first ten days, afterwards rapidly gains upon the old one, and generally overtakes it when they are both about 70 lb. or 80 lb. each; the young one now goes ahead, at the rate of 2 lb. for 1 lb. And, besides the great superiority of the first swarm over the hive which did not swarm, there are the mother hive and probably a second swarm, weighing by the end of the season from 40 lb. to 80 lb. each. Of course these weights will not be gained in seasons not remarkable for honey-gathering; and in unfavourable years, when bees have to be fed, the fewer hives we have the better,—as, in times of calamity, or famine, or want of work, the working classes of Manchester and other cities find it cheaper to give up house and take lodgings-two or three families swarming into one house, instead of each family paying rent for a whole or separate house. But, even in ordinary seasons for honey-gathering, the swarming system is by far the most lucrative.

If asked to explain how it is that swarms put into empty hives gather more honey and do better than hives not weakened by swarming, we might not be able to do so satisfactorily; neither can we explain how it is that a spring-struck verbena grows more vigorously and does better than an autumn-struck one. As with verbenas so with bees: young ones do better and run quite ahead of old ones.

However, we may venture to guess, or give our opinion, as to the reasons why good early swarms of the same or current season outdo those that never swarm at all.

1st, The stimulus of an empty hive makes the bees work harder. In the absence of combs, all the eggs laid

by the queen are lost. Combs must be built to hold both honey and eggs. For the first two or three days, the greater part of the honey gathered is eaten by the bees with a view to secrete wax for comb-building, which goes on with marvellous rapidity. Liebig thinks that it takes 20 lb. of honey to make 1 lb. of wax; but let us suppose that 2 lb. of wax is manufactured from 20 lb. of honey. Now, in good-sized hives there are about 2 lb. of wax. We have known a swarm fill, or nearly fill, its hive with combs, and gain about 28 lb. weight in ten days. What a stupendous amount of work these young colonists performed in ten days! Young swarms work harder, apparently, than older ones.

2d, The combs of swarms are clear and free from a superabundance of farina or bee-bread; therefore the cakes of brood will yield a young bee from every cell, making the hatch of the swarm considerably larger than the old hive. By the end of the season a swarm is much more populous than the other which we have been comparing with it. Even a second swarm, in honey years, will sometimes pull itself abreast the stock or mother hive, with a weight of 30 lb. to gain.

By swarming we double and often treble the number of our hives annually, and therefore have two or three queens laying instead of one. By-and-by it will be seen more clearly how invaluable these additional swarms are to a bee-keeper; and, therefore, the superiority of the swarming system over the non-swarming one.

3d, By the adoption of the swarming mode of management we can change our stock of hives every year; that is to say, we can set aside one of the swarms for stock, and take the honey from the old one and other swarm, and thus our stock is full of new sweet combs, and free from foul brood, which is a great advantage. No hive

should be kept more than two years, as old combs are objectionable for many reasons, and ugly to look at.

Besides all these considerations, there is, in the swarming system well carried out, the CERTAINTY of success in bee-keeping. On the non-swarming system, hives are comparatively weak in bees in early spring; whereas, on the swarming system (as we recommend it to be done), the hives are of great strength and power even in early spring. And we maintain that ten strong hives will do more work than twenty-five weak ones. How does the swarming system secure strong hives? In this way: the bee-keeper has one and often two swarms to spare for every hive he selects for stock in autumn. This selected hive for stock gets the one or two extra swarms united to it, and thus becomes doubly or trebly strong. Hives of such strength are well able to face the difficulties of a severe winter-difficulties that often crush and kill weak ones; and when spring arrives, these strong hives gain weight fast, and are ready to swarm a month earlier than those that had no additional bees given to them in the autumn. In this neighbourhood bees do not gather much honey after the apple-blossoms fall, there being scarcely any white clover near enough. If the hives are weak in bees they gain but little from fruit-blossoms, which are so rich in honey, simply because they are not strong enough to do much work; but when made strong in autumn by the addition of extra swarms, they gain here, off the fruit-blossoms, in fine weather, from 3 lb. to 5 lb. per hive.

4th, On the non-swarming mode of management the queens become old and die; and at the time of the death of a queen there is a loss sustained. The hive in which she dies is without eggs for three weeks, or thereabouts; for ordinarily the young queens are not matured