Page:Supplement to the fourth, fifth, and sixth editions of the Encyclopaedia Britannica - with preliminary dissertations on the history of the sciences - illustrated by engravings (IA gri 33125011196181).pdf/749

  the hives may, if occasion require it, be placed upon each other, and the covers be adapted to any of the hives that may happen to be at the top.

The pyramidal hive of M. Ducouédie, which the inventor extols in his book, entitled, La Ruche Pyramidale, avec l’art d’établir et d’utiliser les ruches, &c. as leaving nothing more to be wished for as to the cultivation of bees, differs but little from that of Mr Thorley. A common straw hive is taken, containing a swarm, which is allowed to remain till the spring of the following year; it is then placed on the top of a square box, with which it is made to communicate by a round aperture at the top of the box. In this state, it is termed by the French la ruche Ecossaise, or, ruche de M. de la Bourdonnaye. On the following spring, a second box is placed under the first, and the whole now assumes the name of la ruche pyramidale. The bees are still allowed no other ingress or egress, but by a single hole made in the lowest story. The upper stories may then be removed im succession, while further room is allowed below by the addition of fresh boxes. It is stated by M. Ducouédic, that the bees in his pyramidal hive never perish by hunger or by cold; for they always abound in provisions, and are too numerous to he affected by the most rigorous winter. When the bees are in groupes, they maintain the necessary warmth in the hive, and the brood, on the return of spring, is hatched one month sooner than in any other hive. Mr Huish has, however, made it clearly appear, that these pretended advantages are much exaggerated, while its inconveniences are passed over in silence. It is difficult, if not impossible, to proportion the hives in all cases to the magnitude of the swarms, or to the energy with which they labour. The honey being taken from the oldest cells, is deteriorated by an admixture of pollen, communicating to it a degree of bitterness, of which it is difficult to deprive it; and is less abundant in consequence of the diminished capacity of the cells, in which the coccoons of successive bees in their state of nympha have accumulated. From their being divided into different stories, the bees are obliged to live, as it were, in different families; while their own preservation, and that of the brood, requires them to live in the strictest union. The heat is also lessened by the division of the bees into different groupes. The upper part of these hives, being all necessarily flat (except the first or straw hive), occasions a serious inconvenience, by allowing moisture to collect and drop down into the middle of the hive, instead of trickling down the sides. The injury which this does to the combs, and to the bees themselves, who are constantly exposed to its influence, is, according to Mr Huish, the most common cause of the loss of the hives during the winter. The bees, he observes, always begin their work in the most elevated point of the hive, and seek for that purpose the central part of the roof. If the top be flat, and especially if it be as spacious as in the hives called pyramidal, the bees will not find this centre; they will work one year in one part, and the following year in another. This is, without doubt, one of the causes which obliges a proprietor to wait three or four years before any honey can be gathered from these hives.

The hive recommended by Mr Huish, as affording sufficient facility for examining any of the combs, and performing on them any operation at pleasure, is very similar in form to that described in the Encyclopædia (See ) as being used in Greece; and of which a figure has been given. The body of the hive is a straw basket in the shape of a flower-pot, that is, of a broader diameter above than below. Eight pieces of well seasoned wood, about eight inches broad, and half an inch thick, are laid parallel to one another, at equal distances, over the top of the basket, and fastened to an outer projecting band: they are then covered with net-work, over which is placed a circular board, or what is better, a convex cover of straw extending over the whole of the top of the hive. This net-work obliges the bees to fasten their combs to the transverse boards; by means of which, each comb can easily be lifted up, without interfering with any other part of the hive, or occasioning the loss of a single bee; and the whole of the interior of the hive is thus open to inspection, and we are enabled to trace the devastations of the moth, or to ascertain the presence of any other enemy.—See the article in this Supplement.

APPRENTICE. The nature and object of the engagement contracted between the apprentice and his master, has been sufficiently explained in the body of this work. As, however, numerous laws have been passed, particularly in England, for the purpose, not only of guaranteeing the performance of this contract, but of regulating also the terms upon which it should be entered into by the respective parties, and of defining the relative duties of each, it will be necessary shortly to state the most important of these regulations.

In that country, the 5th Eliz. continued for a long period to be the leading statute on this subject; but its regulations were at length found to be fraught with such numerous inconveniences, arid to be so ill adapted to the present improved state of the mechanical trades, that, by the 54th Geo. III. several of its most material provisions were repealed. By the 5th Eliz. it was required, in order to give validity to the contract of apprenticeship, that the apprentice should be bound by a regular deed; and, by the custom of some places, it was necessary that the deed or indenture should he enrolled. In London the custom is, that all indentures be enrolled, within a year, before the Chamberlain; and, if this form shall have been neglected, it is enacted that a writ of scire facias shall issue upon the petition of the Mayor and Aldermen, to show cause why it was not enrolled. If it shall be found that this omission proceeded from the fault of the master, the apprentice may sue out his indentures, and be discharged; and, if otherwise, the contract ceases to be binding on the master. The 5th Eliz. c. 4, § 25, also provided, that no apprenticeship could be constituted except by indenture; and it was found, that, under a different instrument, a master could not maintain an action against a person for enticing away and detaining his apprentice. The same act provided, that no agreement to execute indentures of apprenticeship should constitute a