BEE-spoke-data/bees-v0 huggingface dataset:
Take a bushel of sweet briar leaves, as much of thyme; half a bushel of rosemary leaves, and a peek of bay leaves; and having well washed them, boil them in a copper of fair water: let them boil the space of half an hour, or better, and then pour out all the water and herbs into a fat, and let it stand till it be but milk warm; then strain the water from the herbs, and take to every gallon of water one gallon of the finest honey, and beat it together for the space of an hour; then let it stand two days, stirring it well twice or thrice a day; then take the liquor and boil it again, and skim it as long as there remains any scum; when it is clear, put into a fat as before, and let it stand to cool. You must then have in readiness a five of new ale or beer, which as soon as you have emptied suddenly, presently put in the metheglin, and let it stand three days a working, and then tun it up in barrels, tying at every tap hole, by a peek thread, a little bag of beaten cloves and mace, to the value of an ounce. It must stand half a year before it be drank.
ROSAL MEAD.
In six gallons of water put six quarts of honey, stirring it till the honey is thoroughly mixed; then set it over the fire, and when ready to boil, scum it very well; add one quarter of an ounce of mace, as much ginger, half an ounce of nutneg, some sweet marjoram, thyme, and sweet briar, together a handful; boil it in the liquid; let it stand till cold; set it working with a little yeast in a barrel, putting the bung lightly on, and filling it up from time to time with some of the same liquid. When it has done working, bung it up tight, and leave it in the eask several months before bottling it off. When it has been bottled some time it will effervesce like the best Engtish gooseberry wine, and will keep, I doubt not, for years. _Probatum est._
N.B.--One quart is equal to 341bs. of strained honey.
Back mead.
Put one gallon of water to four pounds of honey; boil it three quarters of an hour, and seam it well. For every gallon of the liquor add an ounce of hops; boil it half an hour, and let it stand till next day. Put it into a cask, and to every thirteen gallons of liquor add a quart of brandy. Put the bung on lightly till the fermentation is over, then stop it very close. If you make a large cask, keep it a year before you bottle it.
BOTTLED BEER, LIER SCOCH TWOPENY.
To fourteen gallons of water add a pound of hops previously steeped in a little water; boil it half an hour; strain it and let it run upon the honey, about a pound and three quarters to each gallon of liquor, more or less. When cool, put it in a barrel, and ferment as before. This is an excellent summer drink; as is the following:--
GINGER WINE.
To eight quarts of water put eight ounces of ginger, twenty-four pounds of honey, and eight lemons. Work and bottle as before.
In the two last receipts the strength of the word may be increased or diminished by varying the proportion of honey.
Honey vinegar.
Put a pound of honey to a quart of water, mix well, and then expose in the greatest heat of the sun, without wholly closing the bung hole, which must be covered with coarse linen to keep out insects. In about six weeks it will be changed to vinegar of an excellent quality. A spoonful or two of this vinegar mixed with cold water is a very agreeable summer drink. It may be either used plain or made to effervese by a little soda.
A cunning housewife doubtless would improve on many of these receipts; her main difficulty in supplying a family with these beverages will be in straining the honey, which runs very slowly when of a thick quality. This I think may be obviated by boiling clean honey combs in a due proportion of water, and then letting the liquor stand till cold, when the wax will have formed on the top, and may be taken off. Then proceed as above.
A less agreeable, though not less useful, application of honey, is in the form of a cough mixture.
Fill a quart bottle three parts full of clarified honey, mix well with this a teaspoonful of Ipecacuanha, then fill up with sharp vinegar: a spoonful or two of this, whenever the cough is troublesome, will have a very good effect.
HIVES.
1. The set of bee boxes, consisting of three boxes fourteen inches square, and four and a half inches deep, glazed and painted, with bottom board, top, and cover for the glass, should be well made by any respectable carpenter for 15s. Any person who has difficulty in getting them made may do so, to any extent, by sending a letter with a remittance, to Mr. Hunter, carpenter, care of the Bee-master, St. John's College. Any one who is going to have a number made by his own carpenter would do well to get one as a pattern, and then follow it exactly. The advantage of these wooden boxes is, that if kept well painted, and protected from the sun, they will, with care, last almost for ever.
2. The common straw hive may be well made for 1s. 6d. They should be so strong that a man may stand on the top without bending them in. A very good mode of making the hole in the top, is to work a turned wooden collar into it, with a one and a half inch hole. This, when not in use, may be stopped quite tight with a large cork, or wooden plug:-mind that your straw hives are not made smaller at the mouth than in the middle, as it is then very difficult to get the combs out; and don't use cross sticks. I can't repeat this too often.
## Chapter 112
I have told you that you cannot learn so much from any be book as from your bees themselves. Each bee master must observe for himself, and not trust solely to the observations of others ; and what he sees he must record, as much for his own benefit as that of his friends. Eyes are common to all men : the great odds are in the way different men use them ; or rather, in the way they make use of what they see. One man observes a thing, and straightway forgets it, or lets the facts which he has seen tunable up and down in his brain, like a number of small parcels, all without directions, thrown promiseously into an ill arranged store : the owner has a very poor chance of ever finding again any parcel he wants ; at all events, he opens a great many wrong ones, and has the trouble of trying them up again, to say nothing of the time he looses in the search, even if he succeeds at last : whilst the accurate observer sorts, arranges, ties up, and labels, every fact that he sees ; throws away the rubbish, and puts that which is worth preserving into one of the cupboards or pigeon holds into which his brain is divided. Besides this, he keeps an index of the contents of his brain, such as the accompanying bee register which I have printed for your use : so, mind you fill it up accurately, and in a few years you will have a large store of observations. Each hive should be numbered, and the weight of the box painted outside, before you put the bees into it : give each swarm a page in your register : put down, in the proper column, the weight of honey you take from each ; the swarms which you get ; the boxes you put each into ; and then, at any time, you can tell how large a family you have had from each hive.
**REMARK S.**
Found the Queen fallen at the front of the hive; put her into the observatory
hive; she was immediately made close prisoner.
## Appendix B E E H I V E S.
Two-slver Media Awarded to Geo, Neighboring A'sons, at the Paris Exhibition of 1857. The only English Exhibitors who obtained a Silver Medal for Deehives.
Digitized by the Internet Archive
in 2010 with funding from
University of British Columbia Library
**M AN U A L**
**B E E-K E E P I N G.**.
**Br**
**JOHN HUNTER,**
_Henorary Secretary of the British Bee-keepers' Association._
" Some have taught
That Bees have portions of etherial thought,
Ended with particles of heavenly fires,
For God the whole created mass inspires."--Yrostl.
ROBERT HARDWICKE, 192, PICCADIILY,
**AND ALL BOOKSELLERS.**
**1875.**Drupce & Bateman, Trinters, **13** & **17**, Fortugal Street, Lincoln's 1na Fields.
PREFAUE.
Is my position as Honorary Secretary of the British Bec-keepers' Association, I have frequently been asked to recommend a moderately priced book, which would instruct the inquirer how properly to manage his Bees; to my great regret I have been unable to give a satisfactory reply. I was acquainted with no work embracing the requisites of cheapness and completeness up to our present standard of knowledge, to bring it within the means of the many. The best work in the English language is unquestionably _Langstroth on the_._ Honey Bee_; but this is published in America, and costs here Ten shillings and sisepence. All others that I knew did not explain the various systems and apparatus sufficiently, or were too costly for general us. It was universally acknowledged that the Apiarian Exhibition of 1874 had given an immense impetus to Bee-culture, and I had great hopes that one of our clever and learned Bee-masters would have announced during the Winter a new work on the subject, which would fulfil the desired conditions ; but the 1st day of February, 1875, arrived, and I had not heard the wished-for news ; so, reluctant to let the Spring appear without the needed help, I resolved, _faute de mieux_, to attempt the work myself ; and, having sought and found a publisher, began and completed this little Manual in my leisure evening hours of the month of February. This I must beg may excuse any deficiencies that may be discovered.
My work is very unpretentious. I am fully aware there are many shortcomings, possibly errors, in it ; and I am perfectly conscious of my inability to do justice to my task, for I may at once say I make no pretence to originality, therefore have not scrupled to extract from the writings of previous authors any drawings or matter where I felt myself unable to improve on them. I have been particularly indebted in this way to _Langstroth on the Honey Bee, The _British Bee Journal,_ the articles of Mr. Cheshire, in _The Country, The Journal of **H**orticulture, King's Beekeepers' Text Book,_ and _Neighbour's Apiracy._ I have, **I** believe, in most cases acknowledged the author from whom **I** have borrowed.** If, in any instance, this is omitted, it is unintentionally ; therefore **I** hope to be pardoned. My aim has been to make known the various new inventions and appliances in apiculture, and to encourage the culture of the Bee, by showing what wealth is lost to the nation at large by its neglect and to give in a popular and handy form practical instructions to the novice which may start him fairly on the road to profitable Bee-keeping in a merciful and rational manner. Is it too presumptuous to hope, also, that the adept may herein find some useful hints and facts with which he was not acquainted? Earnestly trusting that my work may not be in rain,
\[egin{array}{c}\mbox{I am, \&e.,}\ \mbox{JOHN HUNTER}.\end{array}\]
_5, Eaton Rise,_
Ealing, Middlesex.
A Manual of Bee-KEEPING.
NATURAL HISTORY OF THE HONEY BEE.
"What atom forms of insect life appear!
And who can follow Nature's pencil here?"--Mas. BARALLD,
From the very earliest historic times, the Hive Bee has been cultivated by man for the sake of the delicious honey and useful was that- it produces, as well as studied for the manifold lessons it furnishes in industry and physiology.
The busy merchant, when wanting a symbol of industry for his house, could find no better sign than the " Bee-hive." How common the axiom, " A very Hive of Industry." The poet and the moralist fails not to quote our little friend as an example to the young ; and the beautifulymn of Dr. Watts, of " The Little Busy Bee," can never be forgotten as a memory of our early days, and in ages to come will be taught to our children's children with the same loving wish of a good result as was hoped for us.
To the naturalist and man of science, the Bee affords a never ending store of Nature's wonders ; although philosophers, from Aristomachus, four centuries before the Christian era, Cicero, Pliny, Philiscus, Virgil, Theophrastes, Plutarch, and Columella, to those of modern times, Miraldi, Raumur, Sir Christopher Wren, and the illustrious blind I Huber, all wrote upon and studied the Bee, the wonders it unfolds are not yet exhausted.
The limits of this little work will not permit me to go very deeply into physiology, but an understanding of this subject to some extent is quite necessary to all who would comprehend the why and wherefore of many important facts which I shall have to mention as I proceed. In Great Britain and on the Continent of Europe there is cultivated, so far as I know, but one species of Hive Bee, although of this there are several varieties. Our common English, or Black Bee, has been scientifically named _Apis Melliice;_ and the Italian, or Ligurian Bee, _Apis Ligustiea;_ but all entomologists agree that they are one and the same species.
Dr. Gerstacker even goes so far as to consider the Egyptian Bee _Apis Kasciata,_ and another African Bee _Apis Adansonii,_ as varieties also. The best authorities are in a difficulty as to which Bee should rank as the species--whether to say _Apis Melliica var Ligustiea or vice versa._ The former, I think, is the more generally adopted; but our distinguished Nynenopterist, Mr. Frederick Smith, of the British Museum, seems to consider the most highly coloured as the typical form; and it is possibly more correct to give the precedence to _Apis Ligustiea,_ but it cannot be decided satisfactorily until we know in what country _Apis Melliica_ really originated.
Physiologically I can detect no difference between Liguians and Black Bees. Individuals vary in size as well as in colour; but, on dissecting a number of each variety, the difference is nil, and no microesopist could separate a series of any given organs of both, if mixed indiscriminately. A live of Bees in June consists of three different kinds of individuals, viz. : a Queen, Workers, and Drones.
In abnormal circumstances, the first and last of these may be absent, the second never. The Queen is the only _perfect_ female.
" First of the throng and foremost of the whole,
One stands confest the Sovereign and the soul."--Vrnall.
If the colony has not swarmed, the mother of every other Bee in the live is the Queen, and who is the only means by which the population can be kept up or increased. But _one_ Queen is allowed to exist in each live, although one or two exceptional cases have been recorded where this almost invariable rule has for a short time been broken. Her shape is widely different to that of the other Bees. She is not nearly so bulky as a Drone, but her body is longer and considerably more tapering, more so even than that of a Worker. Her abdomen is also generally lighter in colour than the other Bees ; and when she has fully entered upon her duties as a Matron, her movements are slow and majestic, and she can rarely be induced to take wing. The sole business of the Queen is to lay eggs. No part of the work of the hive is done b by her, and she is usually found surrounded by many of her subjects standing in a circle, with their heads towards her, ready to clean, feel, or otherwise attend to her and take care of the deposited eggs. Whenever her majesty changes her position, the Bces make way for her, always closing round and keeping the circle up, allowing free space for her movements in the centre. The sight of a Queen thus attended is one of the most curious and interesting things in a hive. The Queen has a sting, but has never been known to use it, except in combat with another Queen. The Workers form the bulk of the population, and are the smallest Bces in the hive. They are furnished with an exceedingly curious tongue, with which they obtain honey from the flowers and convey it to their mouth, whence it passes to the honey bag to be afterwards ejected into the cells. The hind legs of the Workers are furnished with a spoon shaped hollow, called the " Pollen Basket," in which they convey that material to the hive. 'The length of life of a Worker Bee is determined by the amount of work it does, and the introduction of Ligurian Queens at various seasons enables us to determine this question with almost certainty. After the introduction of a fertile Ligurian Queen to a colony of Black Workers in May, if we examine the hive two months subsequently, we shall find very few Black Bces remain, all having died and been replaced with Ligurians ; and as, probably, at the time the strange Queen commenced her reign, some eggs or young larvae of her predecessor remained, we may conclude then that six weeks is the limit of time a Worker Bee will live in summer. Should the new Queen be introduced in October, not until April following will the same state of affairs be found; so that it is evident the quietude and rest of winter prolongs the Bee's life fourfold.
"Another race the spring and fall supplies,
They droop successive and successive rise."--Evaxs.
According to Reaumur, there are 5,376 Workers in each pound weight, and the celebrated John Hunter counted 2,160 in an imperial pint. A populous hive will often contain 40,000 or 50,000 Workers, whose part in the economy of the colony is, as their name implies, _to work_--by them all the labour is done: honey gathered, wax made, combs built, young tended, in fact, everything that requires work is accomplished by the Workers. These Bees are barren, or more properly speaking, not fully developed females, which may be proved on dissection, the organs of their sex being easily discoverable, although not in a fully developed state. Workers have a sting, which they are ever ready to use on an enemy, even though, as is usually the case, their lives pay the penalty, for, being barbed, the sting is retained in the wound and drags out with it part of the Bee's intestines. The Drones are the males, whose sole office is to fertilize the young Queens. They are much stouter than either the Queen or the Workers, but do not exceed the Queen in length. They have no sting with which to defend themselves, no basket on their legs for pollen, no exretery organs for wax, and no suitable tongue for gathering honey from the flowers. Under ordinary circumstances, they only exist in the summer, when young Queens may be expected to emerge; and a colony having sent forth its compliment of swarms, the Drones are immediately slaughtered by the Workers; they accomplish this butchery by biting, teasing, and starving their unfortunate brothers, for they seem to know that if they use their stings they themselves will die. Often a Drone may be seen with two or more Workers gnawing at his wings and legs, then, thrown from the hive, he perishes for want of power to rise again ; and while the massacre is in full progress, the floor of the hive may be found covered with wounded Drones in various stages of starvation, kept there by the Bees until they die or can be thrown out. The number of Drones in a hive varies considerably from 100 or 200 to some thousands.
"The sad-ey'd justice with his surly hum,
Delivering o'er to executors pale,
The lazy, yawing Drone."Shakespeare.
The cog of a Bee is of a pearly white ; it is slightly curved, and in length several times greater than in breadth ; it is deposited on the bottom of the cell on its end, and stands somewhat obliquely; there is no difference either in size or colour in Drone and Worker eggs, _and any Worker egg may be made to produce a Queen at the evill of the Bee-master._ To the uninitiated, this statement looks fabulous ; but I will presently endeavour to show so clearly how it is possible, that I think the most increulous must be convinced. I will even go further, and state my belief that eggs may be taken which, uninterfered with, would produce Drones (males), and that it is in the power of the skilful scientific Apianian so to act, that at his will they shall produce either Queens, Drones, or Workers! When we observe a Queen in the act of ovipisting, we see her put her head into a cell, remain a second or two, apparently inspecting the future cradle, to see that all is in order, then, withdrawing her head, she curves her body down into the cell, turns half round, and, retiring, leaves an egg behind her. When she laysa considerable number, she does it equally on exactly opposite sides of the comb, thus concentrating and economising heat for the development of the brood. Three or four days afterwards, the eeg is hatched, and a small white larva or caterpillar makes it appearance; it lies coiled up, and floats in a whitish transparent fluid, which is deposited in sufficient quantity by the Workers, and which forms its nourishment. It grows until the two extremities meet and form a ring, and about the fifth or sixth day it occupies nearly the whole length and breadth of the cell.
The Bees now seal over the cell with a cover made cf wax and Bee-bread, whose colour matches that of the surrounding old combs. This cover is convex, that of the Drone cells more so than that of the Workers, and minute holes in it admit air to the larva. Like most other insects, the larva having completed its growth spins round itself a whitish silky' cocoon, in which it undergoes the change to a pupa or chrysalis, and eventually in due time appears at maturity as an _inago_, or perfect insect; Workers in twenty-one, Drones in twenty-five days.
For some time after Bees emerge from the pupa state, they employ themselves within the hive as Nurses and comb builders; they may be readily distinguished by a greyish bloom they appear to wear. The period of their seclusion, before they commence honey gathering, varies from a few days to two or three weeks, according to the season.
"With food attention guard each genial cell
And watch the embryo, bursting from the cell."--Evaxs.
The foregoing description applies to Workers and Drones, but not to Queens; these latter are only rearedby the Bees when they are Quencless, or when Queens are likely to be wanted in swarming time. Suppose, however, that from either of these causes a Quecn is required--there are no such things as Queen eggs except in the general sense--the eggs of a Worker or young Worker larvae not more than three days old, will furnish material with which the Bees can raise their Quecns. A certain number of these eggs or larvae are selected by the Bees if they have them, by the Beesmaster if they have not ; in the latter case a piece of comb containing them must be supplied as described more fully under the chapter "Quencn-breeding ;" round these the Workers will immediately build large cells of a totally different form from the ordinary Worker or Drone cells, cutting away all other cells that stand in their way; and to the young larvae therein, they will supply a much larger quantity of food of a highly nitrogenous character called " Royal Jelly," in a thick bed of which the larva may be seen lying ; the effect of this is, that a total change takes place in the development of the Bec, and in five days less time than would have been occupied in maturing a Worker, the Quecn emerges to fulfil her allotted destiny as the future mother of an immense family.
If the Aparian introduce a small quantity of this "Royal Jelly" from a Queen cell, into a Worker cell, containing a young larva, it is said the Bees will rear that selected larva into a Quecn, and a phenomenon that sometimes happens in a hive when a Worker is found, which is sufficiently fertile to ovipist, is surmised to occur from the Bees having partly fed it, when a larva on Royal Jelly, causing a greater development of its sexual organs, but yet not sufficient to constitute a Queen. These fertile Workers only produce Drones, and they are sometimes a great nuisance in a hive, and from the impossibility of distinguishing them from the other workers they are difficult to remove. Mr. Rorl suggests that the Bees should be driven and removed away from their stand, and allowed to fly home; the fertile Worker never having before flown would not know her way home, and would be probably lost.
The fertility of the Queen Bee is enormous; in this respect, some greatly exceed others; a young Queen will usually lay more eggs in a given time than an old one, which is only according to the natural order of things. In the height of the summer season, with combs in good order, a Queen will lay 2,000 to 3,000 eggs per day, and she lives four or five years.