ture. below the usual heat of a hive, is calculated to excite our admiration of the instinctive intelligence of the bee, which leads it to distribute its treasure in small cells and to seal them closely over, whereby the honey can be preserved from fermentation for a long period, even in a high temperaPROUST says that granulated honey is capable of being separated into two parts, one of which is liquid, the other dry and not deliquescent, crystallizable in its manner and less saccharine than sugar. The Jews of Moldavia and the Ukraine prepare from honey a sort of sugar which is solid and as white as snow, which they send to the distilleries at Dantzic. They expose the honey to frost for three weeks, in some place where neither sun nor snow can reach it, and in a vessel which is a bad conductor of caloric, by which process the honey, without being congealed, becomes clear and hard like sugar. Prior to the discovery of sugar, honey must have been an article of great utility; and notwithstanding that discovery, if we may judge from the quantity imported into this country, and the price at which it sells when of fine quality, it may still be regarded as a commodity of great importance, and worthy of more attention from our rural population than it in general obtains. In the Ukraine, some of the peasants have four or five hundred hives each, and find their bees more profi table than their corn. This is a number however which I should think would overstock most districts, and which could only be supported naturally by having recourse to transportation. This seems to be evinced by the inhabitants of Egypt, France, Savoy, Piedmont and other places availing themselves of that practice, as already stated. The most productive parts of this kingdom, in all probability, are the borders of Cambridgeshire, Hertfordshire, and part of Hampshire, which abounding in heaths, commons and woods, afford so much pabulum for bees, as to enable some of the farmers to have from 100 to 150 stocks of them, the largest number that I have ever heard of in this kingdom. On the subject of overstocking, Mr. Espinasse says that few parts of England which he has visited afford flowers in sufficient profusion and of sufficient variety to support numerous colonies. "In the village," says he, "where my house is situated, many persons, induced by my example, procured bees; they were too numerous for what was to feed them; more than one half of them died in the ensuing winter, and nearly one third of my own were with difficulty saved by feeding." The proprietor of bees may know whether or not his situation is overstocked, if he will attend to the produce of his apiary for several years together. CHAPTER XXX. MEAD. PRIOR to the introduction of agriculture into Britain, mead was the principal cordial beverage of its inhabitants. In other northern nations also it was formerly in high estimation. This must have proceeded, either from their unpampered simplicity of taste, or from their having a better method of making their mead than has been handed down to posterity; for certainly in the present day it is a liquor seldom heard of, and still seldomer made; and when made, holding a very humble rank among our imperfect vinous productions. It however continued in favour long after the introduction of malt liquor, and the northern inhabitants of Europe drank it generally until very modern times. To show how highly it was formerly esteemed in this country, I will give an extract from an ancient law of the principality of Wales, where "the praises of it, accompanied by the lyre, resounded through the spacious halls of her princes." "There are three things in Court which must be communicated to the king, before they are made known to any other person. "1st, Every sentence of the judge; Mead-making appears to have been regarded by our forefathers as a high and important avocation; at the courts of the Princes of Wales, the mead-maker was the eleventh person in dignity, and took place of the physician. We read in the English History, that Ethelstan a subordinate king of Kent, in the tenth century, on paying a visit to his relation Ethelfleda felt very much delighted that there was no deficiency of mead. According to the custom at royal feasts, it was served up in cut horns and other vessels of various sizes. About the same period, it was customary to allow the monks a sextareum (about a pint) of mead between six of them at dinner, and half the quantity at supper. It was probably the liquor called by Ossian, the joy and strength of shells, with which his heroes were so much delighted; the Caledonian drinking-vessels having consisted of large shells, which are still used by their posterity in some parts of the Highlands. Mention is sometimes made also of the Feast of Shells. Mead was the ideal nectar of the Scandinavian nations, which they expected to quaff in heaven out of the skulls of their enemies; and, as may reasonably be supposed, the liquor which they exalted thus highly in their imaginary celestial banquets, was not forgotten at those which they really indulged in upon earth. Hence may be inferred the great attention which must have been paid to the culture of the bee in those days, or there could not have been an adequate supply of honey for the production of mead, to satisfy the demand of such thirsty tribes. The mythology of Scandinavia (the religion of our Gothic ancestors) was imparted by Sigge or Odin, a chieftain who migrated from Scythia with the whole of his tribe, and subdued either by arms or arts the northern parts of Europe. From him descended Alaric and Attila. In the singular paradise which Odin sketched for his followers, the principal pleasure was to be derived from war and carnage; after the daily enjoyment of which, they were to sit down to a feast of boar's flesh and mead. The mead was to be handed to them in the skulls of their enemies, by virgins somewhat resembling the houri of the Mahometan paradise, and plentiful draughts were to be taken, until intoxication should crown their felicity. Hence the poet PENROSE thus commences his "Carousal of Odin." "Fill the honey'd bev'rage high, |