entrances are well sheltered, and accommodation is afforded for the bees, when they are at any time driven home, by stress of weather, in greater numbers than can readily pass through the entrances into the boxes; for on the approach of a storm, the bees will sometimes return home from the fields, in such numbers and with such precipitation, as almost to block up the entrances into the hives.

The building is not only thatched on the top, but down the sides and ends, as low as the potatoe-cellar. On that side where the bees enter the boxes, the thatch of course terminates at the top of the compartments, over which it is spread out so as to conceal the slate coverings. The floor of the bee-house is boarded and the potatoe-cellar is ceiled, the space between the ceiling and the floor above being filled with dry sawdust. The door may be situated where most convenient; but the window or windows should be at one end or at both ends, that the light may fall sideways on the bee-boxes, and should be made to open, as in case of any of the bees accidentally getting into the bee-house, they may be let out more conveniently.

It is necessary to have an extra entrance, or rather an extra outlet, for discharging the bees when the time of deprivation arrives, which will be hereafter explained. My own outlet is placed in a line with and between the lower tier of boxes.

CHAPTER IV.

PASTURAGE.

Ir is of the first importance to the success of an apiary, that it should be in a neighbourhood where the bees can be supplied with an abundance of good pasturage, as upon that will depend the fecundity of the queen and the harvest of wax and honey.

If Dutch clover (Trifolium repens) be neither grown abundantly by the neighbouring farmers, nor the spontaneous growth of the surrounding country, the apiarian should, if possible, crop some ground with it himself, as it is one of the grand sources from which bees collect their honey in the spring, and indeed during a considerable portion of the principal gathering season. From the value of clover in this respect, one species of it (Trifolium pratense) has acquired the name of Honey-suckle clover. Yellow trefoil also (Medicago lupulina), though not so great a favourite with the bees as Dutch clover, is nevertheless a valuable pasturage for them, in consequence of its blossoming earlier than the clover.

Though I have made Dutch clover take precedence of every other bee pasturage, a precedence which in this country at least it is fairly entitled

to, yet it is by no means the first in the order

of the seasons.

"First the gray willow's glossy pearls they steal,
Or rob the hazel of its golden meal,

While the gay crocus and the violet blue

Yield to the flexile trunk ambrosial dew." EVANS.

The earliest resources of the bee are the willow, the hazel, the osier, the poplar, the sycamore and the plane, all which are very important adjuncts to the neighbourhood of an apiary. The catkins of several of them afford an abundant supply of farina, and attract the bees very strongly in early spring when the weather is fine. Mr. Kirby, in his Monographia Apum Angliæ, considers the female catkins of the different species of Salix as affording honey, the male ones, pollen.

To these may be added the snowdrop, the crocus, white alyssum, laurustinus, &c.

Orange and lemon trees also, and other greenhouse plants, afford excellent honey, and might be advantageously presented to the bees at this

season.

Gooseberry, currant and raspberry trees likewise, with sweet marjoram, winter savory and peppermint, should not be far off them. From the early blossoming of the two first, and from their yielding an extraordinary quantity of honey, they form some of the first sources of spring food for

the bees, and in all probability furnish them with the pale green pellets, then seen upon their thighs.

The peach, nectarine, &c. are also valuable, on account of their blossoming very early.

Apple and pear trees, which in Worcestershire and Herefordshire, during several weeks of spring, seem to form

"One boundless blush, one white empurpled shower Of mingled blossoms,"

66

and give those counties the appearance of a perfect paradise, 'may be said to constitute a second course for the bees, after their earlier spring feast on the bloom of the currants, gooseberries, and all the varieties of wall fruit."

Alder buds and flowers are also particularly grateful to bees; the former are said to afford honey for six months together. The maple and the lime also afford it for a considerable time.

Dickson, in his "Agriculture," states that the blossoms of the bean, which are highly fragrant, though affording but a scanty supply of honey, are nevertheless frequented by crowds of bees. "Is this," says Dr. Evans, "an instance of mistaken instinct?"

The young spotted leaves of the vetch (Anthyllis vulneraria) they likewise ply continually for three months together, as well as its flowers, even though very distant from their homes. The beans also

which prove most attractive to them are those with spotted leaves.

From the partiality of these natural chemists for the spotted leaves of the vetch and bean, I suspect that the spotting originates from disease, which causes those leaves to throw out a honeyed secretion. In this opinion I am strengthened by what Mr. Hubbard has stated, in a paper presented to the Society of Arts for 1799, respecting papilionaceous plants. "It is not," says he, "from the flower, but a small leaf, with a black spot on it, which, in warm weather, keeps constantly oozing, that the bees gather their honey." Mr. Hubbard also assures us in the same paper that the tare (Ervum hirsutum et tetraspermum) is highly useful to bees; and that several acres, sown near his apiary, otherwise badly situated, rendered it very productive.

Turnips, mustard, and all the cabbage tribe are also important auxiliaries; their culture is strongly recommended by Wildman, as affording spring food to the bees. In the autumn a field of buckwheat becomes a very valuable resource for them, from its prolonged succession of bloom. Buckwheat flowers in bunches, which contain ripe seeds in one part, while blossoms are but just opening in another. Huber has given his testimony in favour of this black grain, and Worlidge says that he has known the bees of a very large apiary fill the combs with