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time (the best season to do it) the hives are or ought to be populous; and to the beginner it seems a formidable operation to look the frames over, and find one bee among so many. Place an empty hive by the side of the one you wish to examine; after opening the latter very gently, sprinkle it well with sweetened water. It is better not to alarm them by the use of smoke when you wish to find the queen. Begin near the centre, and take out a frame, and look carefully on each side of it. If she is not on it, put it in the empty hive, and take out another, proceeding in the same way. If the queen is found on neither of them, spread a sheet before the hive which now contains the frames, and empty upon it the bees that remain clinging to the hive. If she is among them you will see her as she passes into the hive. If you do not find her, return the frames to the other hive, examining them with care. I have often found the queen on the first frame I took out; and then, again, have taken them all out three times before seeing her. There is little difficulty in finding Italian queens; they are not disposed to hide, and their bright colors make them very conspicuous. Those who are Italianizing large apiaries, or rearing queens for sale, need no advice in the matter, yet may be interested in some items of my experience. I have succeeded better in rearing queens in moderately large hives than in the small ones generally used for the purpose. I now have my nucleus hives, containing three frames, the size of my large hives. A hive containing twelve frames, which can be divided into four parts at will, is very convenient, the entrance into two of the parts being at the ends, and in the others at the sides. Such a hive is warmer than a single nucleus, which is important in the early part of the year.

If such a hive contains a pure Italian queen, and she be taken from it in May, there will be eggs in each of the four parts when the dividers are put in, and from thirty to.forty queen cells will be started at once. In ten days as many of these as you please can be cut out and given to other hives, but four or more should be left in it. The young queens hatched in these hives are very sure to mark their place when they go out for their excursions, as the size and entrance make it peculiar in appearance.

Much complaint is made that the whole colony is apt to go out from a nucleus hive when the queen leaves for impregnation and does not return; thus queen and all are lost. There is a sure remedy for this: Bees never desert a hive, large or small, while there is brood in it. If, then, a frame containing eggs and larvæ be given to the small colony from another hive, about the time the queen will hatch, the bees will not desert it. Some have trouble in making the bees build more than one or two cells in these little hives. That is because they do not have large proportion of young bees in them. The young bees of the current year are the ones that work the wax and build queen cells. They may be seen before they are twenty-four hours old at work on them. Keep plenty of bee bread and honey in the small hive, and supply it with water and young and hatching bees, and you will have numerous cells.

Be always sure that, in the hives where you are rearing queens, there are no eggs except from a queen of undoubted purity. It has been declared impossible for bees to remove their eggs from one cell to another, but I now know that they do so. Last year I put into nucleus hives, each, a frame containing eggs, while the other combs, full of honey and bee-bread, were those preserved from hives from which the bees had been taken, and which had been all winter in a cold room. By no probability could an egg have been in these, yet repeatedly were green cells built in them, and perfect queens hatched from them. I do not pretend to say how the bees remove so delicate a thing as one of those little eggs without injury; but is it really any more wonderful than some of their other operations?

I have reared queens every week from the 1st of April to the last of October,

and could perceive no difference in size or coloring at the different seasons; but out of eighteen reared in April last only two became fertile; and of twenty-two reared in October, all but four were lost, while nearly all those reared in May, June, and July were impregnated.

I do not find the pure Italian queens larger in size than the common ones; but queens reared from a pure Italian mother, fertilized by a common drone, are often very large and handsome. The colonies of such queens are, in every respect, equal to the pure. All such queens may be safely preserved, as their drones are pure. But no queens should be raised from them, and if swarms issue from their hives the queens should be taken from them and pure ones given them, for nothing pure comes from a queen reared from such queens. No one should be contented to stop short of giving a queen which will produce drones the first season to every hive he has, whether it be one or one hundred. This accomplished, your work is more than half done. The importance of this is manifest, for you will then have no common drones in your apiary the second season. When this is the case you can keep your own colonies strong, "swarm" them early, and have little to fear from outsiders.

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So long as you have common drones a large proportion of your queens will meet them. I raised one hundred and forty-three queens the first season, which became fertile, and though I had many Italian drones in a dozen hives, and suppressed the common drones as much as possible, only twenty-six of my young queens were fertilized by Italians.

It is said, and I doubt not with truth, that in all Italian stock brought to this country there is a taint of impurity. This is of little consequence if we keep our stock pure. By exercising proper care, we can not only keep them as good as the original, but also do much to improve them. I have several young queens even more beautiful than those I bought, and queens reared from them are as fine as any I have ever seen. Every one which does not produce pure drones should be replaced as soon as this is discovered, and those which are only hybrid may be changed before swarms are taken from them. All this requires care and patience, but it pays well to take this care.

În no way can the yield of honey be so sensibly increased as by introducing the Italian bee into different localities. As it replaces the old variety a great change will be observed.

I cannot think it wise for those rearing queens to sell to send out any but those tested and proved pure. The practice of selling hybrid queens, or of sending those not tested, to those who are commencing in the business, promising to replace them if not pure, is a bad one. The beginner (who, perhaps, has never seen an Italian bee) cannot himself be a judge of purity, and in nine cases out of ten will be satisfied with what he gets, and rear from it. Though he will find any mixture of the Italian blood an improvement on his old stock, yet, in the second generation, he will have nothing pure, and be disappointed and discouraged. One had better pay a large price for a queen warranted pure by one whose reputation is at stake in the matter than to get a hybrid cheap, and find, in a year or two, that he has had all his trouble for little or nothing. I would advise every one purchasing a queen to clip her wings before putting her in a new home. It not only prevents her leaving the hive with a swarm at any time, but you are always sure that she is the one you bought, for bees often destroy a queen for no apparent reason.

SUBDUING bees, bee-dRESS, ETC.

I find a great difference between the Italian and common bees in their irascibility. The former are much more easily managed. Still the timid will do well always to use some precautions. Sprinkling with sugar water is the

best means of subduing them when you wish to open the hive. If you wish to find a queen readily do not use smoke, it induces her to hide; but for any other examination of the hive it answers well. A wire hat with a deep curtain to it, and a pair of rubber gloves with gauntlets, make a perfect protection against stings. The gloves are very expensive, as they soon wear out from contact with the bee glue or propolis. I find a pair of woollen mittens, with thumb and finger, as knit for soldiers' use, quite as good protection. They should be dipped in cold water before using. From these glue can be easily removed. A quiet, fearless manner when among bees does much to prevent their anger. No stand should ever be made angry; they do not soon forget it, and after they are once enraged they are difficult to subdue.

ADAPTATION OF THE BUSINESS TO WOMEN.

Health is to be derived from it. The ancients called the honey bee "Deborah, or she that speaketh." Would that its gentle hum might now speak to many women in our land, and awaken an interest in a pursuit so interesting, and, at the same time, so profitable. The quick observation and gentle handling, so requisite in the business, belong peculiarly to women, and there is no part of it which is laborious, or that may not be appropriately performed by them.

It has proved to me of great benefit. I came west twelve years ago, under sentence of speedy death from one of New England's best physicians, yet now rejoice in perfect health restored. More than to all other causes I attribute the change to the interesting occupation which has kept me so much of the time in the open air, and paid me for being there. I most heartily recommend.it to others, who are seeking either health or a pleasant and profitable employment.

WHITE CHESTER BREED OF SWINE.

BY PASCHALL MORRIS, PHILADELPHIA, PENN.

The most approved and desirable points of the white Chester breed of swine are length and depth of carcass, breadth of back, small bone, very small head in comparison with the size of carcass, full ham, shoulders full and well pushed towards the head, leaving little or no neck, heavy jowl, dished face, thin skin, straight hair, and straight back.

The engraving represents a large and fine animal, combining in considerable perfection all the above points. He will be sixteeen months old on the 1st of January, 1867, and is estimated to weigh at that time, when he will be slaughtered, at least 550 pounds. His face is remarkably small. This is one of the most difficult points to secure, and is often an indicator of the rest of the figure, as well as of fattening properties. I have always found that a hog with a dish-face, short nose, small head, and breadth between the eyes, is right nearly everywhere else, and is an easy and quiet feeder. On the other hand, a long nose, and a long and large head, indicate, in a general way, a hard and uneasy feeder and a great consumer.

The white Chester breed of swine is not an original, but a "made-up" breed, being a cross between the best native stock of Chester county and an imported Bedfordshire boar. He was imported by Captain James Jeffries more than forty

years ago, and his stock was well distributed over the country. The differences now observed, sometimes, in the white Chesters, so that they can hardly be identified as one breed, are owing to the extra care taken by some farmers in selecting their breeding stock, or to their various fancies. Some prefer an erect ear, others a lop-car; some prefer a slight curliness or wave of the hair, others to have it perfectly straight; some do not wish a large carcass, but a small and compact one, attaining a weight, at a year old, of about 300 pounds. The western farmers, living where corn is plenty, require a very large animal. These differences do not detract from the merits of the Chester county hog, as regards good general figure, easy feeding, and capacity to return a greater weight and value for food consumed than any breed now known. Farmers who breed for weight usually estimate a gain of one pound per day till they are two years old, and these very often far exceed this. They have attained a weight of over 900 pounds, and 500 to 600 pounds is very common.

That the Chester county pig is not an original, but a mixed breed, is proved in the very great variety in their appearance and in feeding qualities. Like does not produce like in all cases; and what is called "breeding back” is quite common. There is no absolute certainty of the offspring being like either sire or dam. Very fine and perfectly-shaped sows often have indifferent pigs, and very fine pigs are also occasionally produced from ill-shapen mothers. Sometimes blue spots on the skin and black spots in the hair occur. These are probably to be traced to a cross of Berkshire, a breed at one time quite common in Chester county. Improved stock of every description, to be kept up to a certain standard, requires continuous care in breeding and feeding. Hence the common saying, as respects swine, that "the breed is in the trough." While it must be admitted that the good points and properties of the Chester county breed are not so confirmed and established, that like will always produce like, there is yet, taking the best samples, so full a development of nearly perfect figure, quiet habits, and fattening tendencies, as to make a capital ground-work, which some energetic farmer may use as a starting point, as Bakewell, and Ellman, and Webb did with sheep, and bring up the white Chesters to a still higher standard and a more determined type.

The hog is often the poor man's main reliance, every portion of it being susceptible of use; and if his weight at a given age can be doubled on the same amount of food, a vast benefit will be conferred on the economic interests of the masses, and a large addition to the aggregate wealth of the country.

MODEL PIGGERY.

BY PASCHALL MORRIS, PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA.

The plan of the piggery delineated in the accompanying engraving is susceptible of reduction or extension, for a larger or smaller number of pigs, and is intended to supersede the not only useless, but objectionable as well as expensive, mode of constructing large buildings under one roof, where confined and impure air, as well as the difficulty of keeping clean, interfere greatly with both health and thrift. Twenty-five or thirty breeding sows, farrowing at different periods of the year, can be accommodated under this system of separate peus, by bringing them successively within the enclosure; or an equal number of hogs can be fattened without any crowding or interference with each other. Some two years

ago I sold a very fine pair of Chester county pigs to a customer, (not a farmer,) who complained that at the end of twelve months they only weighed 175 pounds each. On inquiry as to his management, I found they had been kept in the horse stable, which was cleaned regularly once a month. It was dark and badly ventilated, and the pigs were entirely out of reach of sun and pure air. The tenacity of life shown by the white Chesters, under such circumstances, spoke well for the breed. Thrift and growth were of course impracticable. Neither the white Chester, nor any other breed with which we are acquainted, will do well in confined or close quarters; and where too many are kept in a single pen the heat of contact is very apt to create mange.

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The nature of a hog, no less than the composition of his food, indicates a large amount of animal heat, and we have always noticed that they suffer much more from heat and confinement than from cold. This fact is kept in view in the above arrangement. The entrance, as seen in the engraving, is on the north side of the building, which therefore fronts the south, as does also each separate pen. The main building is thirty-two feet long by twelve wide, with an entrance gate at each lower corner to the yard of two first divisions. The entry or room in the centre is eight feet wide, allowing space for slop barrel, feed chest, charcoal barrel, (almost as indispensable as feed chest,) hatchway for access to root cellar underneath the whole building, and also passage way to second story. This latter is used for storing corn in winter and curing some varieties of seeds in summer. A wooden spout, with sliding valve, conveys feed to the chest below. The grain is hoisted to the second floor by a pulley and tackle on the outside, as observed in engraving.

The perspective of main building allows a partial view of platforms, surmounted by a board roof, and divisions in the rear. The ground plan allows six of these on either side of the passage way. The first two pens, to the right and left of the door, are 12 by 12 each, and attached to them are 25 feet in length of yard

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