kept, the chapter on "Loss of Queens," alone, will, with
attention, save to any one, not in the secret, enough in one season to
be worth more in value than many times the cost of this work. The same
might be said of those on diseased brood, artificial swarms, wintering
bees, and many others.

If such a work could have been placed in my hands twenty years ago, I
should have realized hundreds of dollars by the information. But
instead of this, my course has been, first to suffer a loss, and then
find out the remedy, or preventive; from which the reader may be
exempt, as I can confidently recommend these directions.

Another new feature will be found in the duties of each season being
kept by itself, commencing with the spring and ending with the winter
management.

In my anxiety to be understood by all classes of readers, I am aware
that I have made the elegant construction and arrangement of sentences
of secondary importance; therefore justly liable to criticism. But to
the reader, whose object is information on this subject, it can be of
but little consequence.

CHAPTER I.

A BRIEF HISTORY.

THREE KINDS OF BEES.

Every prosperous swarm, or family of bees, must contain one queen,
several thousand workers, and, part of the year, a few hundred drones.

[Illustration: QUEEN.] [Illustration: WORKER.] [Illustration: DRONE.]

QUEEN DESCRIBED.

The queen is the mother of the entire family; her duty appears to be
only to deposit eggs in the cells. Her abdomen has its full size very
abruptly where it joins the trunk or body, and then gradually tapers to
a point. She is longer than either the drones or workers, but her size,
in other respects, is a medium between the two. In shape she resembles
the worker more than the drone; and, like the worker, has a sting, but
will not use it for anything below royalty. She is nearly destitute of
down, or hairs; a very little may be seen about her head and trunk.
This gives her a dark, shining appearance, on the upper side--some are
nearly black. Her legs are somewhat longer than those of a worker; the
two posterior ones, and the under surface, are often of a bright copper
color. In some of them a yellow stripe nearly encircles the abdomen at
the joints, and meets on the back. Her wings are about the same as the
workers, but as her abdomen is much longer, they only reach about
two-thirds the length of it. For the first few days after leaving the
cell, her size is much l