Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, "Bedlam" to "Benson, George"
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Title: Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, "Bedlam" to "Benson, George"
Author: Various
Release date: December 1, 2010 [eBook #34533]
Language: English
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Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
Transcriber's notes:
(1) Numbers following letters (without space) like C2 were originally
printed in subscript. Letter subscripts are preceded by an
underscore, like C_n.
(2) Characters following a carat (^) were printed in superscript.
(3) Side-notes were relocated to function as titles of their respective
paragraphs.
(4) Macrons and breves above letters and dots below letters were not
inserted.
(5) [root] stands for the root symbol; [alpha], [beta], etc. for greek
letters.
(6) The following typographical error has been corrected:
ARTICLE BENGALI: "The sound of such a final a is in all three
languages the same as that of the second o in 'promote'; thus, the
Bg. bara is pronounced boro." 'second' amended from 'seccond'.
ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA
A DICTIONARY OF ARTS, SCIENCES, LITERATURE
AND GENERAL INFORMATION
ELEVENTH EDITION
VOLUME III, SLICE V
Bedlam to Benson, George
ARTICLES IN THIS SLICE:
BEDLAM BELLENDEN, JOHN
BEDLINGTON BELLENDEN, WILLIAM
BEDLOE, WILLIAM BELLEROPHON
BEDMAR, ALPHONSO BELLA CUEVA BELLES-LETTRES
BED-MOULD BELLEVILLE (Ontario, Canada)
BEDOUINS BELLEVILLE (Illinois, U.S.A.)
BEDSORE BELLEY
BEDWORTH BELLI, GIUSEPPE GIOACHINO
BEE BELLIGERENCY
BEECH BELLINGHAM, SIR EDWARD
BEECHER, CHARLES EMERSON BELLINGHAM
BEECHER, HENRY WARD BELLINI
BEECHER, LYMAN BELLINI, LORENZO
BEECHEY, FREDERICK WILLIAM BELLINI, VINCENZO
BEECHEY, SIR WILLIAM BELLINZONA
BEECHING, HENRY CHARLES BELLMAN, KARL MIKAEL
BEECHWORTH BELLO, ANDRES
BEEF BELLO-HORIZONTE
BEEFSTEAK CLUB BELLONA
BEELZEBUB BELLOT, JOSEPH RENE
BEER BELLOWS, ALBERT F.
BEERSHEBA BELLOWS, HENRY WHITNEY
BEESLY, EDWARD SPENCER BELLOWS and BLOWING MACHINES
BEET BELLOY, DORMONT DE
BEETHOVEN, LUDWIG VAN BELL or INCHCAPE ROCK
BEETLE BELLUNO
BEETS, NIKOLAAS BELMONT, AUGUST
BEFANA BELOIT
BEFFROY DE REIGNY, LOUIS ABEL BELOMANCY
BEGAS, KARL BELON, PIERRE
BEGAS, REINHOLD BELPER
BEGGAR BELSHAM, THOMAS
BEGGAR-MY-NEIGHBOUR BELSHAZZAR
BEGONIA BELT, THOMAS
BEGUINES BELT
BEHAIM, MARTIN BELTANE
BEHAR BELUGA
BEHA UD-DIN BELVEDERE (architectural structure)
BEHA UD-DIN ZUHAIR BELVIDERE (Illinois, U.S.A.)
BEHBAHAN BELZONI, GIOVANNI BATTISTA
BEHEADING BEM, JOSEF
BEHEMOTH BEMA
BEHISTUN BEMBERG, HERMAN
BEHN, APHRA BEMBO, PIETRO
BEHR, WILLIAM JOSEPH BEMBRIDGE BEDS
BEIRA (seaport of East Africa) BEMIS, EDWARD WEBSTER
BEIRA (province of Portugal) BEMONT, CHARLES
BEIRUT BEN
BEIT, ALFRED BENARES
BEJA (tribe) BENBOW, JOHN
BEJA (city) BENCE-JONES, HENRY
BEJAN BENCH
BEJART BENCH-MARK
BEK, ANTONY BENCH TABLE
BEKE, CHARLES TILSTONE BEND
BESKESCSABA BENDA
BEKKER, AUGUST IMMANUEL BENDER
BEKKER, BALTHASAR BENDIGO
BEKKER, ELIZABETH BENDL, KAREL
BEL BENEDEK, LUDWIG
BELA III. BENEDETTI, VINCENT
BELA IV. BENEDICT
BELA (capital of Las Bela) BENEDICT OF ALIGNAN
BELA (town of India) BENEDICT OF NURSIA, SAINT
BELAY BENEDICT, SIR JULIUS
BELCHER, SIR EDWARD BENEDICT BISCOP
BELDAM BENEDICTINE
BELESME, ROBERT OF BENEDICTINES
BELFAST (Ireland) BENEDICTION
BELFAST (Maine, U.S.A.) BENEDICTUS
BELFORT (division of France) BENEDICTUS ABBAS
BELFORT (town of France) BENEDIX, JULIUS RODERICH
BELFRY BENEFICE
BELGAE BENEFICIARY
BELGARD BENEKE, FRIEDRICH EDUARD
BELGAUM BENETT, ETHELDRED
BELGIAN CONGO BENEVENTO
BELGIUM BENEVOLENCE
BELGRADE BENFEY, THEODOR
BELHAVEN AND STENTON, JOHN BENGAL
BELISARIUS BENGAL, BAY OF
BELIT BENGALI
BELIZE BENGAZI
BELJAME, ALEXANDRE BENGEL, JOHANN ALBRECHT
BELKNAP, JEREMY BENGUELLA
BELKNAP, WILLIAM WORTH BENI (river of Bolivia)
BELL, ALEXANDER GRAHAM BENI (department of Bolivia)
BELL, ALEXANDER MELVILLE BENI-AMER
BELL, ANDREW BENI-ISRAEL
BELL, SIR CHARLES BENIN
BELL, GEORGE JOSEPH BENITOITE
BELL, HENRY BENJAMIN
BELL, HENRY GLASSFORD BENJAMIN OF TUDELA
BELL, JACOB BENJAMIN, JUDAH PHILIP
BELL, JOHN (Scottish traveller) BEN LEDI
BELL, JOHN (Scottish anatomist) BENLLIURE Y GIL, JOSE
BELL, JOHN (American politician) BEN LOMOND
BELL, ROBERT BENLOWES, EDWARD
BELL BEN MACDHUI
BELLABELLA BENNETT, CHARLES EDWIN
BELLACOOLA BENNETT, JAMES GORDON
BELLADONNA BENNETT, JOHN
BELLAGIO BENNETT, JOHN HUGHES
BELLAIRE BENNETT, SIR WILLIAM STERNDALE
BELLAMY, EDWARD BEN NEVIS
BELLAMY, GEORGE ANNE BENNIGSEN, LEVIN AUGUST
BELLAMY, JOSEPH BENNIGSEN, RUDOLF VON
BELLARMINE, ROBERTO ROMOLO BENNINGTON
BELLARY BENNO
BELL-COT BENOIT, PETER LEONARD LEOPOLD
BELLEAU, REMY BENOIT DE SAINTE-MORE
BELLECOUR BENSERADE, ISAAC DE
BELLEFONTAINE BENSLEY, ROBERT
BELLEGARDE BENSON, EDWARD WHITE
BELLEGARDE, HEINRICH JOHANNES BENSON, FRANCIS ROBERT
BELLE-ILE-EN-MER BENSON, FRANK WESTON
BELLE-ISLE, CHARLES FOUQUET BENSON, GEORGE
BELLE ISLE, STRAIT OF
BEDLAM, or BETHLEHEM HOSPITAL, the first English lunatic asylum,
originally founded by Simon FitzMary, sheriff of London, in 1247, as a
priory for the sisters and brethren of the order of the Star of
Bethlehem. It had as one of its special objects the housing and
entertainment of the bishop and canons of St Mary of Bethlehem, the
mother-church, on their visits to England. Its first site was in
Bishopsgate Street. It is not certain when lunatics were first received
in Bedlam, but it is mentioned as a hospital in 1330 and some were there
in 1403. In 1547 it was handed over by Henry VIII. with all its revenues
to the city of London as a hospital for lunatics. With the exception of
one such asylum in Granada, Spain, the Bethlehem Hospital was the first
in Europe. It became famous and afterwards infamous for the brutal
ill-treatment meted out to the insane (see INSANITY: _Hospital
Treatment_). In 1675 it was removed to new buildings in Moorfields and
finally to its present site in St George's Fields, Lambeth. The word
"Bedlam" has long been used generically for all lunatic asylums.
BEDLINGTON, an urban district of Northumberland, England, within the
parliamentary borough of Morpeth, 5 m. S.E. of that town on a branch of
the North Eastern railway. Pop. (1901) 18,766. It lies on high ground
above the river Blyth, 2-1/2 m. above its mouth. The church of St
Cuthbert shows good transitional Norman details. Its dedication recalls
the transportation of the body of the saintly bishop of Lindisfarne from
its shrine at Durham by the monks of that foundation to Lindisfarne,
when in fear of attack from William the Conqueror. They rested here with
the coffin. The modern growth of the town is attributable to the
valuable collieries of the neighbourhood, and to manufactures of nails
and chains. It is one of the most populous mining centres in the county.
On the south bank of the river is the township and urban district of
Cowpen (pop. 17,879), with collieries and glass works; coal is shipped
from this point by river.
Bedlington (Betlingtun) and the hamlets belonging to it were bought by
Cutheard, bishop of Durham, between 900 and 915, and although locally
situated in the county of Northumberland became part of the county
palatine of Durham over which Bishop Walcher was granted royal rights by
William the Conqueror. When these rights were taken from Cuthbert
Tunstall, bishop of Durham, in 1536, Bedlington among his other property
lost its special privileges, but was confirmed to him in 1541 with the
other property of his predecessors. Together with the other lands of the
see of Durham, Bedlington was made over to the ecclesiastical
commissioners in 1866. Bedlingtonshire was made part of Northumberland
for civil purposes by acts of parliament in 1832 and 1844.
BEDLOE, WILLIAM (1650-1680), English informer, was born at Chepstow on
the 20th of April 1650. He appears to have been well educated; he was
certainly clever, and after coming to London in 1670 he became
acquainted with some Jesuits and was occasionally employed by them.
Calling himself now Captain Williams, now Lord Gerard or Lord Newport or
Lord Cornwallis, he travelled from one part of Europe to another; he
underwent imprisonments for crime, and became an expert in all kinds of
duplicity. Then in 1678, following the lead of Titus Gates, he gave an
account of a supposed popish plot to the English government, and his
version of the details of the murder of Sir E.B. Godfrey was rewarded
with L500. Emboldened by his success he denounced various Roman
Catholics, married an Irish lady, and having become very popular lived
in luxurious fashion. Afterwards his fortunes waned, and he died at
Bristol on the 20th of August 1680. His dying depositions, which were
taken by Sir Francis North, chief justice of the common pleas, revealed
nothing of importance. Bedloe wrote a _Narrative and impartial discovery
of the horrid Popish Plot_ (1679), but all his statements are extremely
untrustworthy.
See J. Pollock, _The Popish Plot_ (1903).
BEDMAR, ALPHONSO BELLA CUEVA, MARQUIS OF (1572-1655), Spanish
diplomatist, became ambassador to the republic of Venice in 1667. This
was a very important position owing to the amount of information
concerning European affairs which passed through the hands of the
representative of Spain. When Bedmar took up this appointment, Venice
had just concluded an alliance with France, Switzerland and the
Netherlands, to counterbalance the power of Spain, and the ambassador
was instructed to destroy this league. Assisted by the duke of Ossuna,
viceroy of Naples, he formed a plan to bring the city into the power of
Spain, and the scheme was to be carried out on Ascension Day 1618. The
plot was, however, discovered; and Bedmar, protected by his position
from arrest, left Venice and went to Flanders as president of the
council. In 1622 he was made a cardinal, and soon afterwards became
bishop of Oviedo, a position which he retained until his death, which
occurred at Oviedo on the 2nd of August 1655. The authorship of an
anonymous work, _Squitinio della liberta Veneta_, published at Mirandola
in 1612, has been attributed to him.
Some controversy has arisen over the Spanish plot of 1618, and some
historians have suggested that it only existed in the minds of the
Venetian senators, and was a ruse for forcing Bedmar to leave Venice.
From what is known, however, of the policy of Spain at this time, it is
by no means unlikely that such a scheme was planned.
See C.V. de Saint-Real, _OEuvres_, tome iv. (Paris, 1745); P.J.
Grosley, _Discussion historique et critique sur la conjuration de
Venise_ (Paris, 1756); P.A.N.B. Daru, _Histoire de la republique de
Venise_ (Paris, 1853); A. Baschet, _Histoire de la chancellerie
secrete a Venise_ (Paris, 1870).
BED-MOULD, in architecture, the congeries of mouldings which is under
the projecting part of almost every cornice, of which, indeed, it is a
part.
BEDOUINS (_Ahl Bedu_, "dwellers in the open land," or _Ahl el beit_,
"people of the tent," as they call themselves), the name given to the
most important, as it is the best known, division of the Arab race. The
Bedouins are the descendants of the Arabs of North Arabia whose
traditions claim Ishmael as their ancestor (see ARABS). The deserts of
North Arabia seem to have been their earliest home, but even in ancient
times they had migrated to the lowlands of Egypt and Syria. The Arab
conquest of northern Africa in the 7th century A.D. caused a wide
dispersion, so that to-day the Arab element is strongly represented in
the Nile Valley, Saharan, and Nubian peoples. Among the Hamitic-Negroid
races the Bedouins have largely lost their nomadic character; but in the
deserts of the Nile lands they remain much what their ancestors were.
Thus the name has suffered much ethnic confusion, and is often
incorrectly reserved to describe such pastoral peoples as the Bisharin,
the Hadendoa and the Ababda. This article treats solely of the Arabian
Bedouin, as affording the purest type of the people. They are shepherds
and herdsmen, reduced to an open-air, roving life, partly by the nature
of their occupations, partly by the special characteristics of the
countries in which they dwell. For, while land, unsuited to all purposes
except pasture, forms an unusually large proportion of the surface in
the Arabian territory, the prolonged droughts of summer render
considerable portions of it unfit even for that, and thus continually
oblige the herdsmen to migrate from one spot to another in search of
sufficient herbage and water for their beasts. The same causes also
involve the Bedouins in frequent quarrels with each other regarding the
use of some particular well or pasture-ground, besides reducing them not
unfrequently to extreme want, and thus making them plunderers of others
in self-support. Professionally, the Bedouins are shepherds and
herdsmen; their raids on each other or their robbery of travellers and
caravans are but occasional exceptions to the common routine. Their
intertribal wars (they very rarely venture on a conflict with the
better-armed and better-organized sedentary population) are rarely
bloody; cattle-lifting being the usual object. Private feuds exist, but
are usually limited to two or three individuals at most, one of whom has
perhaps been ridiculed in satirical verse, to which they are very
sensitive, or had a relation killed in some previous fray. But bloodshed
is expensive, as it must be paid for either by more bloodshed or by
blood-money--the _diya_, which varies, according to the importance of
the person killed, from ten to fifty camels, or even more. Previous to
Mahomet's time it was optional for the injured tribe either to accept
this compensation or to insist on blood for blood; but the Prophet,
though by his own account despairing of ever reducing the nomad portion
of his countrymen to law and order, succeeded in establishing among them
the rule, that a fair _diya_ if offered must be accepted. Instances are,
however, not wanting in Arab history of fiercer and more general Bedouin
conflicts, in which the destruction, or at least the complete
subjugation, of one tribe has been aimed at by another, and when great
slaughter has taken place. Such were the wars of Pekr and Thagleb in the
6th century, of Kelb and Howazin in the 8th, of Harb and Ateba in the
18th.
The Bedouins regard the plundering of caravans or travellers as in lieu
of the custom dues exacted elsewhere. The land is theirs, they argue,
and trespassers on it must pay the forfeit. Hence whoever can show
anything equivalent to a permission of entrance into their territory
has, in the regular course of things, nothing to fear. This permission
is obtained by securing the protection of the nearest Bedouin sheik,
who, for a politely-worded request and a small sum of money, will
readily grant the pass, in the shape of one or two or more men of his
tribe, who accompany the wayfarers as far as the next encampment on
their road, where they hand their charge over to fresh guides, equally
bound to afford the desired safeguard. In the interior of Arabia the
passport is given in writing by one of the town governors, and is
respected by the Bedouins of the district; for, however impudent and
unamenable to law these nomads may be on the frontiers of the impotent
Ottoman government in Syria or the Hejaz, they are submissive enough in
other and Arab-governed regions. But the traveller who ventures on the
desert strip without such precautions will be robbed and perhaps killed.
Ignorant of writing and unacquainted with books, the Bedouins trust to
their memory for everything; where memory fails, they readily eke it out
with imagination. Hence their own assertions regarding the antiquity,
numbers, strength, &c., of their clans are of little worth; even their
genealogies, in which they pretend to be eminently versed, are not to be
much depended on; the more so that their own family names hardly ever
exceed the limits of a patronymic, whilst the constantly renewed
subdivisions of a tribe, and the temporary increase of one branch and
decrease of another, tend to efface the original name of the clan. Few
tribes now preserve their ancient, or at least their historical titles;
and the mass of the Bedouin multitude resembles in this respect a
troubled sea, of which the substance is indeed always the same, but the
surface is continually shifting and changing. As, however, no social
basis or ties are acknowledged among them except those of blood and
race, certain broad divisions are tolerably accurately kept up, the
wider and more important of which may here be noted. First, the Aneza
clan, who extend from Syria southward to the limits of Jebel Shammar. It
is numerous, and, for a Bedouin tribe, well armed. Two-thirds of the
Arab horse trade, besides a large traffic in sheep, camels, wool, and
similar articles, are in their hands. Their principal subdivisions are
the Sebaa on the north, the Walid Ali on the west, and the Ruala on the
south; these are generally on bad terms with each other. If united, they
could muster, it is supposed, about 30,000 lances. They claim descent
from Rabi'a. Second, the Shammar Bedouins, whose pasturages lie
conterminous to those of the Aneza on the east. Their numbers are about
the same. Thirdly, in the northern desert, the Huwetat and Sherarat,
comparatively small and savage tribes. There is also the Solibi clan,
which, however, is disowned by the Arabs, and seems to be of gipsy
origin. Next follow, in the western desert, the Beni-Harb, a powerful
tribe, supposed to muster about 20,000 fighting men. They are often
troublesome to the Meccan pilgrims. In the eastern desert are the Muter,
the Beni-Khalid, and the Ajmans, all numerous clans, often at war with
each other. To the south, in Nejd itself or on its frontiers, are the
Hodeil, Ateba, and others. These all belong to the "Mustareb," or
northern Arabs.
The Bedouins of southern or "pure Arab" origin are comparatively few in
number, and are, with few exceptions, even poorer and more savage than
their northern brethren. Al-Morrah, on the confines of Oman, Al-Yam and
Kahtan, near Yemen, and Beni-Yas, between Harik and the Persian Gulf,
are the best known. The total number of the Bedouin or pastoral
population throughout Arabia, including men, women, and children,
appears not to exceed a million and a half, or about one fifth of the
total population. The only tribal authority is the "elder," or "sheik,"
a title not necessarily implying advanced age, but given to any one who,
on account of birth, courage, wealth, liberality or some other quality,
has been chosen to the leadership. Descent has something to do with
rank, but not much, as every individual of the tribe considers himself
equal to the others; nor are the distinctions of relative riches and
poverty greatly taken into account. To the "sheik" all disputes are
referred; he is consulted, though not necessarily obeyed, on every
question which regards the general affairs of the tribe, whether in
peace or war; there is no other magistrate, and no law except what he
and the other chief men may consider proper. But in fact, for most
personal and private affairs, every man does pretty much what is right
in his own eyes.
All the Bedouins, with the exception of certain tribes in Syria, are
nominally Mahommedans, but most pay but slight attention to the
ceremonial precepts of the Koran; the five daily prayers and the annual
fast of Ramadan are not much in favour among them; and however near a
tribe may be to Mecca, few of them visit it as pilgrims. The militant
Wahhabi have, however, from time to time enforced some degree of
Islamitic observance among the Bedouins of Nejd and the adjoining
districts: elsewhere Mahommedanism is practically confined to the
profession of the Divine Unity; among the remoter and wilder tribes
sun-worship, tree-worship, and no worship at all, are not uncommon. Some
clans even omit the rite of circumcision altogether; others, like the
tribe of Hodeil, south of Mecca, perform it after a fashion peculiar to
themselves.
Though polygamy is not common among Bedouins, marriages are contracted
without any legal intervention or guarantee; the consent of the parties,
and the oral testimony of a couple of witnesses, should such be at hand,
are all that are required; and divorce is equally easy. Nor is mutual
constancy much expected or observed either by men or women; and the
husband is rarely strict in exacting from the wife a fidelity that he
himself has no idea of observing. Jealousy may indeed occasionally bring
about tragic results, but this rarely occurs except where publicity, to
which the Bedouins, like all other Arabs, are very sensitive, is
involved. Burckhardt writes: "The Bedouins are jealous of their women,
but do not prevent them from laughing and talking with strangers. It
seldom happens that a Bedouin strikes his wife; if he does so she calls
loudly on her _wasy_ or protector, who pacifies the husband and makes
him listen to reason .... The wife and daughters perform all domestic
business. They grind the wheat in the handmill or pound it in the
mortar; they prepare the breakfast and dinner; knead and bake the bread;
make butter, fetch water, work at the loom, mend the tent-covering ...
while the husband or brother sits before the tent smoking his pipe." A
maiden's honour is, on the other hand, severely guarded; and even too
openly avowed a courtship, though with the most honourable intentions,
is ill looked on. But marriage, if indeed so slight and temporary a
connexion as it is among Bedouins deserves the name, is often merely a
passport for mutual licence. In other respects Bedouin morality, like
that of most half-savage races, depends on custom and public feeling
rather than on any fixed code or trained conscience, and hence admits of
the strangest contradictions. Not only are lying and exaggeration no
reproach in ordinary discourse, but even deliberate perjury and
violation of the most solemn engagements are frequent occurrences. Not
less frequent, however, are instances of prolonged fidelity and
observance of promise carried to the limits of romance. "The wind," "the
wood," and "the honour of the Arabs" are the most ordinary oaths in
serious matters; but even these do not give absolute security, while a
simple verbal engagement will at other times prove an inviolable
guarantee. Thus, too, the extreme abstemiousness of a Bedouin alternates
with excessive gorgings; and, while the name and deeds of "robber" are
hardly a reproach, those of "thief" are marked by abhorrence and
contempt. In patience, or rather endurance, both physical and moral, few
Bedouins are deficient; wariness is another quality universally
developed by their mode of life. And in spite of an excessive coarseness
of language, and often of action, gross vice, at least of the more
debasing sorts that dishonour the East, is rare.
Most Bedouins, men and women, are rather undersized; their complexion,
especially in the south, is dark; their hair coarse, thick and black;
their eyes dark and oval; the nose is generally aquiline, and the
features well formed; the beard and moustache are usually scanty. The
men are active, but not strong; the women are generally plain. The dress
of the men consists of a long cotton shirt, open at the breast, often
girt with a leathern girdle; a black or striped cloak of hair is
sometimes thrown over the shoulders; a handkerchief, folded once, black,
or striped yellow and red, covers the head, round which it is kept in
its place by a piece of twine or a twisted hairband. To this costume a
pair of open sandals is sometimes added. Under the shirt, round the
naked waist, a thin strip of leather plait is wound several times, not
for any special object, but merely out of custom. In his hand a Bedouin
almost always carries a slight crooked wand, commonly of almond-wood.
Among the Bedouins of the south a light wrapper takes the place of the
handkerchief on the head, and a loin-cloth that of the shirt. The women
usually wear wide loose drawers, a long shirt, and over it a wide piece
of dark blue cloth enveloping the whole figure and head, and trailing on
the ground behind. Very rarely does a Bedouin woman wear a veil, or even
cover her face with her overcloak, contenting herself with narrowing the
folds of the latter over her head on the approach of a stranger. Her
wrists and ankles are generally adorned with bracelets and rings of blue
glass or copper or iron, very rarely of silver; her neck with glass
beads; ear-rings are rare, and nose-rings rarer. Boys, till near
puberty, usually go stark naked; girls also wear no clothes up to the
age of six or seven.
On a journey a Bedouin invariably carries with him a light,
sharp-pointed lance, the stem of which is made of Persian or African
cane; the manner in which this is carried or trailed often indicates the
tribe of the owner. The lance is the favourite and characteristic weapon
of the Arab nomad, and the one in the use of which he shows the greatest
skill. An antiquated sword, an out-of-date musket, an ornamented dagger
or knife, a coat of mail, the manufacture of Yemen or Bagdad, and a
helmet, a mere iron head-piece, without visor or crest, complete his
military outfit.
A Bedouin's tent consists of a few coverings of the coarsest goat-hair,
dyed black, and spread over two or more small poles, in height from 8 to
9 ft., gipsy fashion. If it be the tent of a sheik, its total length may
be from 30 to 40 ft.; if of an ordinary person, less than 20 ft.
Sometimes a partition separates the quarters of the women and children;
sometimes they are housed under a lower and narrower covering. A rough
carpet or mat is spread on the ground; while camel-saddles, ropes,
halters, two or three cooking pots, one or two platters, a wooden
drinking bowl, the master's arms at one side of the tent, and his spear
stuck in the ground at the door, complete the list of household
valuables. On striking camp all these are fastened on the backs of
camels; the men mount their saddles, the women their litters; and in an
hour the blackened stones that served for a cooking hearth are the only
sign of the encampment. For food the Bedouin relies on his herds, but
rice, vegetables, honey, locusts and even lizards are at times eaten.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Johann Ludwig Burckhardt, _Notes on the Bedouins and
Wahabis_ (1831); Karstens Niebuhr, _Travels through Arabia_ (orig.
Germ. edit. 1772), translated into English by Robert Heron (2 vols.,
Edinburgh, 1792); H.H. Tessup, _Women of the Arabs_ (New York, 1874);
W.S. Blunt, _Bedouin Tribes of the Euphrates_ (1879); Lady Anne Blunt,
_Pilgrimage to Neid_ (1881); Desmoulins, _Les Francais d'aujourd'hui_
(Paris, 1898); C.M. Doughty, _Arabia Deserta_ (2 vols., 1888); E.
Reclus, _Les Arabes_ (Brussels, 1898); Rev. S.M. Zwemer, _Arabia, the
Cradle of Islam_ (1900); W. Robertson Smith, _Kinship and Marriage in
Early Arabia_ (Cambridge, 1885); H.C. Trumbull, _The Blood Covenant_
(Philadelphia, 1891).
BEDSORE, a form of ulceration or sloughing, occasioned in people who,
through sickness or old age, are confined to bed, resulting from
pressure or the irritation of sweat and dirt. Bedsores usually occur
when there is a low condition of nutrition of the tissues. The more
helpless the patient the more liable he is to bedsores, and especially
when he is paralysed, delirious or insane, or when suffering from one of
the acute specific fevers. They may occur wherever there is a pressure,
more especially when any moisture is allowed to remain on the bedding;
and thus lack of cleanliness is an important factor in the production of
this condition. In large hospitals a bedsore is now a great rarity, and
this, considering the helplessness of many of the patients treated,
shows what good nursing can do. The bed must be made with a firm smooth
mattress; the undersheet and blanket must be changed whenever they
become soiled; the drawsheet is spread without creases, and changed the
moment it becomes soiled. Preventive treatment must be followed from the
first day of the illness. This consists in the most minute attention to
cleanliness, and constant variation in the position of the patient. All
parts subjected to pressure or friction must be frequently washed with
soap and hot water, then thoroughly dried with a warm soft towel. The
part should next be bathed in a solution of corrosive sublimate in
spirits of wine, and finally dusted with an oxide of zinc and starch
powder. This routine should be gone through not less than four times in
the twenty-four hours in any case of prolonged illness. The pressure may
be relieved over bony prominences by a water-pillow or by a piece of
thick felt cut into a ring. Signs of impending bedsores must constantly
be watched for. Where one threatens, the skin loses its proper colour,
becoming either a deadly white or a dusky red, and the redness does not
disappear on pressure. The surrounding tissues become oedematous, and
pain is often severe, except in a case of paralysis. As the condition
progresses further the pain ceases. The epidermis now becomes raised as
in a blister, and finally becomes detached, forming an excoriation and
exposing the papillae. Even at this late stage an actual ulceration can
still be prevented if proper care is taken; but failing this, the skin
sloughs and an ulcer forms. In treating this, the position of the
patient must be such that no pressure is ever allowed on the sloughing
tissue. A hot boracic pad under oil-silk should be applied, the affected
part being first dusted with iodoform. If, however, the slough is very
large, it is safer to avoid wet applications, and the parts should be
dusted with animal charcoal and iodoform, and protected with a dry
dressing. When the slough has separated and the sore is clean, friar's
balsam will hasten the healing process. In any serious illness the
formation of a bedsore makes the prognosis far more grave, and may even
bring about a fatal issue, either directly or indirectly.
BEDWORTH, a manufacturing town in the Nuneaton parliamentary division of
Warwickshire, England; on the Nuneaton-Coventry branch of the London &
North Western railway, 100 m. north-west from London. Pop. (1900) 7169.
A tramway connects with Coventry, and the Coventry canal passes through.
Coal and ironstone are mined; there are iron-works, and bricks, hats,
ribbons and tape and silk are made. Similar industries are pursued in
the populous district (including the villages of Exhall and Foleshill)
which extends southward towards Coventry.
BEE (Sanskrit _bha_, A S. _beo_, Lat. _apis_), a large and natural
family of the zoological order _Hymenoptera_, characterized by the
plumose form of many of their hairs, by the large size of the basal
segment of the foot, which is always elongate and in the hindmost limb
sometimes as broad as the shin, and by the development of a "tongue" for
sucking liquid food; this organ has been variously interpreted as the
true insectan tongue (hypo-pharynx) or as a ligula formed by fused
portions of the second maxillae (probably the latter).
[Illustration: FIG. 1.--Honeybee (_Apis mellifica_). a, male (drone); b,
queen, c, worker.
(After Benton, _Bull._ 1 (n.s.) _Div. Ent._, U.S. Dept. Agr.).]
Bees are specialized in correspondence with the flowers from which they
draw the bulk of their food supply, the flexible tongue being used for
sucking nectar, the plumed hairs and the modified legs (fig. 7) for
gathering pollen. These floral products which form the food of bees and
of their larvae, are in most cases collected and stored by the
industrious insects; but some genera of bees act as inquilines or
"cuckoo-parasites," laying their eggs in the nests of other bees, so
that their larvae may feed at the expense of the rightful owners of the
nest. In a few cases, the parasitic bee-grub devours not only the
food-supply, but also the larva of its host.
[Illustration: FIG. 2.--Head and Appendages of Honey-bee (Apis),
a, Antenna or feeler.
g, Epipharynx.
mxp, Maxillary palp.
pg, Opposite to galeae of 2nd maxillae (labium).
mx, 1st maxilla.
lp, Labial palp.
l, Ligula or "tongue."
b, Bouton or spoon of the ligula.
(From Frank R. Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping_.) ]
_Solitary and Social Bees._--Many genera of bees are represented, like
most other insects, by ordinary males and females, each female
constructing a nest formed of several chambers ("cells") and storing in
each chamber a supply of food for the grub to be hatched from the egg
that she lays therein. Such bees, although a number of individuals often
make their nests close together, are termed "solitary," their
communities differing in nature from those of the "social" bees, among
which there are two kinds of females--the normal fertile females or
"queens," and those specially modified females with undeveloped ovaries
(see fig. 6) that are called "workers" (fig. 1). The workers are the
earliest developed offspring of the queen, and it is their associated
work which renders possible the rise of an insect state--a state which
evidently has its origin in the family. It is interesting to trace
various stages in the elaboration of the bee-society. Among the
humble-bees (_Bombus_) the workers help the queen, who takes her share
in the duties of the nest; the distinction between queen and workers is
therefore less absolute than in the hive-bees (_Apis_), whose queen,
relieved of all nursing and building cares by the workers, devotes her
whole energies to egg-laying. The division of labour among the two
castes of female becomes therefore most complete in the most highly
organized society.
_Structure._--Details of the structure of bees are given in the article
HYMENOPTERA. The feelers (fig. 2, a) are divided into "scape" and
"flagellum" as in the ants, and the mandibles vary greatly in size and
sharpness in different genera. The proboscis or "tongue" (fig. 2, l)
is a hollow organ enclosing an outgrowth of the body-cavity which is
filled with fluid, and with its flexible under-surface capable of
invagination or protrusion. Along this surface stretches a groove which
is surrounded by thickened cuticle and practically formed into a tube by
numerous fine hairs. Along this channel the nectar is drawn into the
pharynx and passes, mixed with saliva, into the crop or "honey-bag"; the
action of the saliva changes the saccharose into dextrose and levulose,
and the nectar becomes honey, which the bee regurgitates for storage in
the cells or for the feeding of the grubs. The sting (fig. 6, pg, st.)
of female bees is usually highly specialized, but in a few genera it is
reduced and useless.
Many modifications in details of structure may be observed within the
family. The tongue is bifid at the tip in a few genera; usually it is
pointed and varies greatly in length, being comparatively short in
_Andrena_, long in the humble-bees (_Bombus_), and longest in
_Euglossa_, a tropical American genus of solitary bees. The legs, which
are so highly modified as pollen-carriers in the higher bees, are
comparatively simple in certain primitive genera. The hairy covering, so
notable in the hive-bee and especially in humble-bees, is greatly
reduced among bees that follow a parasitic mode of life.
[Illustration: FIG. 3.--Larva and Pupa of Apis.
SL, Spinning larva.
N, Pupa.
FL, Feeding larva.
co, Cocoon.
sp, Spiracles.
t, "Tongue."
m, Mandible.
an, Antenna
w, Wing.
ce, Compound Eye.
e, Excrement.
ex, Exuvium.
(From Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping_.)]
_Early stages._--As is usual where an abundant food supply is provided
for the young insects, the larvae of bees (fig. 3, SL.) are degraded
maggots; they have no legs, but possess fairly well-developed heads. The
successive cuticles that are cast as growth proceeds are delicate in
texture and sometimes separate from the underlying cuticle without being
stripped off. The maggots may pass no excrement from the intestine until
they have eaten all their store of food. When fully grown the final
larval cuticle is shed, and the "free" pupa (fig. 3, N) revealed. The
larvae of some bees spin cocoons (fig. 3, _co_) before pupation.
_Nests of Solitary Bees._--Bees of different genera vary considerably in
the site and arrangement of their nests. Many--like the common
"solitary" bees _Halictus_ and _Andrena_--burrow in the ground; the
holes of species of _Andrena_ are commonly seen in springtime opening on
sandy banks, grassy lawns or gravel paths. Our knowledge of such bees is
due to the observations of F. Smith, H. Friese, C. Verhoeff and others.
The nest may be simple, or, more frequently, a complex excavation, cells
opening off from the entrance or from a main passage. Sometimes the
passage is the conjoint work of many bees whose cells are grouped along
it at convenient distances apart. Other bees, the species of _Osmia_ for
example, choose the hollow stem of a bramble or other shrub, the female
forming a linear series of cells in each of which an egg is laid and a
supply of food stored up. J.H. Fabre has found that in the nests of some
species of _Osmia_ the young bee developed in the first-formed cell, if
(as often happens) she emerges from her cocoon before the inmates of the
later cells, will try to work her way round these or to bite a lateral
hole through the bramble shoot; should she fail to do this, she will
wait for the emergence of her sisters and not make her escape at the
price of injury to them. But when Fabre substituted dead individuals of
her own species or live larvae of another genus, the _Osmia_ had no
scruple in destroying them, so as to bite her way out to air and
liberty.
The leaf-cutter bees (_Megachile_)--which differ from _Andrena_ and
_Halictus_ and agree with _Osmia_, _Apis_ and _Bombus_ in having
elongate tongues--cut neat circular disks from leaves, using them for
lining the cells of their underground nests. The carpenter-bees
(_Xylocopa_ and allied genera), unrepresented in the British Islands,
though widely distributed in warmer countries, make their nests in dry
wood. The habits of _X. violacea_, the commonest European species, were
minutely described in the 18th century in one of R.A.F. de Reaumur's
memoirs. This bee excavates several parallel galleries to which access
is gained by a cylindrical hole. In the galleries are situated the
cells, separated from one another by transverse partitions, which are
formed of chips of wood, cemented by the saliva of the bee.
Among the solitary bees none has more remarkable nesting habits than the
mason bee (_Chalicodoma_) represented in the south of France and
described at length by Fabre. The female constructs on a stone a series
of cells, built of cement, which she compounds of particles of earth,
minute stones and her own saliva. Each cell is provided with a store of
honey and pollen beside which an egg is laid; and after eight or nine
cells have been successively built and stored, the whole is covered by a
dome-like mass of cement. Fabre found that a _Chalicodoma_ removed to a
distance of 4 kilometres from the nest that she was building, found her
way back without difficulty to the exact spot. But if the nest were
removed but a few yards from its former position, the bee seemed no
longer able to recognize it, sometimes passing over it, or even into the
unfinished cell, and then leaving it to visit again uselessly the place
whence it had been moved. She would accept willingly, however, another
nest placed in the exact spot where her own had been. If the unfinished
cell in the old nest had been only just begun, while that in the
substituted nest were nearly completed, the bee would add so much
material as to make the cell much larger than the normal size, her
instinct evidently being to do a certain amount of building work before
filling the cell with food. The food, too, is always placed in the cell
after a fixed routine--first honey disgorged from the mouth, then pollen
brushed off the hairs beneath the body (fig. 7, c) after which the two
substances are mixed into a paste.
_Inquilines and Parasites._--The working bees, such as have been
mentioned, are victimized by bees of other genera, which throw upon the
industrious the task of providing for the young of the idle. The nests
of _Andrena_, for example, are haunted by the black and yellow species
of _Nomada_, whose females lay their eggs in the food provided for the
larva of the _Andrena_. According to H. Friese, the relations between
the host and the inquiline are quite friendly, and the insects if they
meet in the nest-galleries courteously get out of each other's way. D.
Sharp, in commenting on this strange behaviour, points out that the host
can have no idea why the inquiline haunts her nest. "Why then should the
_Andrena_ feel alarm? If the species of _Nomada_ attack the species of
_Andrena_ too much, it brings about the destruction of its own species
more certainly than that of the _Andrena_."
More violent in its methods is the larva of a _Stelis_, whose operations
in the nest of _Osmia leucomelana_ have been studied by Verhoeff. The
female _Stelis_ lays her eggs earlier than the _Osmia_, and towards the
bottom of the food-mass; the egg of the _Osmia_ is laid later, and on
the surface of the food. Hence the two eggs are at opposite ends of the
food, and both larvae feed for a time without conflict, but the
_Stelis_, being the older, is the larger of the two. Finally the
parasitic larva attacks the _Osmia_, and digging its mandibles into its
victim's head kills and eats it, taking from one to two days for the
completion of the repast.
[Illustration: FIG. 4.--Under Side of Worker, carrying Wax Scales.
(From Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping_.)]
_Social Bees._--The bees hitherto described are "solitary," all the
individuals being either males or unmodified females. The most highly
developed of the long-tongued bees are "social" species, in which the
females are differentiated into egg-laying queens and (usually)
infertile "workers" (fig. 6). Verhoeff has discussed the rise of the
"social" from the "solitary" condition, and points out that for the
formation of an insect community three conditions are necessary--a nest
large enough for a number of individuals, a close grouping of the cells,
and an association between mother and daughters in the winged state. For
the fulfilment of this last condition, the older insects of the new
generation must emerge from the cells while the mother is still occupied
with the younger eggs or larvae. One species of _Halictus_ nearly
reaches the desired stage; but the first young bees to appear in the
perfect state are males, and when the females emerge the mother dies.
[Illustration: FIG. 5.-Abdominal Plate (worker of _Apis_), under side,
third segment. W, wax-yielding surface, covering true gland; s, septem,
or carina; wh, webbed hairs.
(From Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping_.)]
Among the social bees the mother and daughter-insects co-operate, and
they differ from the "solitary" groups in the nature of their nest, the
cells (fig. 25) of which are formed of wax secreted by special glands
(fig. 5) in the bee's abdomen, the wax being pressed out between the
segmental sclerites in the form of plates (fig. 4), which are worked by
the legs (fig. 7) and jaws into the requisite shape. In our well-known
hive-bee (_Apis_) and humble-bees (_Bombus_) the wax glands are ventral
in position, but in the "stingless" bees of the tropics (_Trigona_ and
_Melipona_) they are dorsal. A colony of humble-bees is started in
spring by a female "queen" which has survived the winter. She starts her
nest underground or in a surface depression, forming a number of waxen
cells, roughly globular in shape and arranged irregularly. The young
females ("workers") that develop from the eggs laid in these early cells
assist the queen by building fresh cells and gathering food for storage
therein. The queen may be altogether relieved of the work of the nest as
the season advances, so that she can devote all her energies to
egg-laying, and the colony grows rapidly. The distinction between queen
and worker is not always clear among humble-bees, the female insects
varying in size and in the development of their ovaries. If any mishap
befall the queen, the workers can sometimes keep the community from
dying out. In autumn males are produced, as well as young queens. The
community is broken up on the approach of winter, the males and workers
perish, and the young queens after hibernation start fresh nests in the
succeeding year.
[Illustration: FIG. 6.--Ovaries of Queen and Workers (_Apis_).
A, Abdomen of queen, under side.
P, Petiole.
o, o, Ovaries.
hs, Position filled by honey-sack.
ds, Position through which digestive system passes.
od, Oviduct.
co.d, Vagina.
E, Egg-passing oviduct.
s, Spermatheca.
i. Intestine.
pb, Poison bag.
pg, Poison gland.
st, Sting.
p, "Palps" or "feelers" of sting.
B, Rudimentary ovaries of ordinary worker.
sp, Rudimentary spermatheca.
C, Partially developed ovaries of fertile worker.
sp, Rudimentary spermatheca.
(From Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping_.)]
The appearance of the heavy-bodied hairy _Bombi_ is well known. They are
closely "mimicked" by bees of the genus _Psithyrus_, which often share
their nests. These _Psithyri_ have no pollen-carrying structures on the
legs and their grubs are dependent for their food-supply on the labours
of the _Bombi_, though, according to E. Hoffer's observations, it seems
that the female _Psithyrus_ builds her own cells. The colonies of
_Bombus_ illustrate the rise of the inquiline habit. Many of the species
are very variable and have been differentiated into races or varieties.
F.W.L. Sladen states that a queen belonging to the _virginalis_ form of
_Bombus terrestris_ often invades a nest belonging to the _lucorum_
form, kills the rightful queen, and takes possession of the nest,
getting the _lucorum_ workers to rear her young. In the nests of _Bombi_
are found various beetle larvae that live as inquilines or parasites,
and also maggots of drone-flies (_Volucella_), which act as scavengers;
the Volucella-fly is usually a "mimic" of the _Bombus_, whose nest she
invades.
The "stingless" bees (_Trigona_) of the tropics have the parts of the
sting reduced and useless for piercing. As though to compensate for the
loss of this means of defence, the mandibles are very powerful, and some
of the bees construct tubular entrances to the nest with a series of
constrictions easy to hold against an enemy. The habits of the Brazilian
species of these bees have been described in detail by H. von Jhering,
who points out that their wax glands are dorsal in position, not ventral
as in _Bombus_ and _Apis_.
With _Apis_, the genus of the hive-bee, we come to the most
highly-specialized members of the family--better known, perhaps than any
other insects, on account of the long domestication of many of the
species or races. In _Apis_ the workers differ structurally from the
queen, who neither builds cells, gathers food, nor tends brood, and is
therefore without the special organs adapted for those functions which
are possessed in perfection by the workers. The differentiation of queen
and workers is correlated with the habit of storing food supplies, and
the consequent permanence of the community, which finds relief for its
surplus population by sending off a swarm, consisting of a queen and a
number of workers, so that the new community is already specialized both
for reproduction and for labour.
[Illustration: FIG. 7.--Modifications in the Legs of Bees.
A. a-d, Hive-bee (_Apis_).
B. f-g, Stingless bee (_Melipona_).
C. h-i, Humble-bee (_Bombus_).
a, f, h, Outer view of hind-leg.
b, g, i, Inner view.
d, Fore-leg of _Apis_ showing notch in tarsal segment for cleaning
feeler.
e, Tip of intermediate shin with spur.
c, Feathered hairs with pollen grains, magnified.
(After Riley, _Insect Life_ (U.S. Dept. Agr.), vol. 6.)]
The workers of _Apis_ may be capable (fig. 6, C) of laying
eggs--necessarily unfertilized--which always give rise to males
("drones"), and, since the researches of J. Dzierzon (1811-1906) in
1848, it has been believed that the queen bee lays fertilized eggs in
cells appropriate for the rearing of queens or workers, and unfertilized
eggs in "drone-cells," virgin reproduction or parthenogenesis being
therefore a normal factor in the life of these insects. F. Dickel and
others have lately claimed that fertilized eggs can give rise to either
queens, workers or males, according to the food supplied to the larvae
and the influence of supposed "sex-producing glands" possessed by the
nurse-workers. Dickel states that a German male bee mated with a female
of the Italian race transmits distinct paternal characters to hybrid
male offspring. A. Weismann, however, doubts these conclusions, and
having found a spermaster in every one of the eggs that he examined from
worker-cells, and in only one out of 272 eggs taken from drone-cells, he
supports Dzierzon's view, explaining the single exception mentioned
above as a mistake of the queen, she having laid inadvertently this
single fertilized egg in a drone instead of in a worker cell.
The cells of the honeycomb of _Apis_ are usually hexagonal in form, and
arranged in two series back to back (figs. 3, 25). Some of these cells
are used for storage, others for the rearing of brood. The cells in
which workers are reared are smaller than those appropriate for the
rearing of drones, while the "royal cells," in which the young queens
are developed, are large in size and of an irregular oval in form (fig.
25). It is believed that from the nature of the cell in which she is
ovipositing, the queen derives a reflex impulse to lay the appropriate
egg--fertilized in the queen or worker cell, unfertilized in the drone
cell, as previously mentioned. Whether the fertilized egg shall develop
into a queen or a worker depends upon the nature of the food. All young
grubs are at first fed with a specially nutritious food, discharged from
the worker's stomach, to which is added a digestive secretion derived
from special salivary glands in the worker's head. If this "royal jelly"
continue to be given to the grub throughout its life, it will grow into
a queen; if the ordinary mixture of honey and digested pollen be
substituted, as is usually the case from the fourth day, the grub will
become a worker. The workers, who control the polity of the hive (the
"queen" being exceedingly "limited" in her monarchy), arrange if
possible that young queens shall develop only when the population of the
hive has become so congested that it is desirable to send off a swarm.
When a young queen has emerged, she stings her royal sisters (still in
the pupal stage) to death. Previous to the emergence of the young queen,
the old queen, prevented by the workers from attacking her daughters,
has led off a swarm to find a new home elsewhere. The young queen, left
in the old home, mounts high into the air for her nuptial flight, and
then returns to the hive and her duties of egg-laying. The number of
workers increases largely during the summer, and so hard do the insects
work that the life of an individual may last only a few weeks. On the
approach of winter the males, having no further function to perform for
the community, are refused food-supplies by the workers, and are either
excluded or banished from the hive to perish. Such ruthless habits of
the bee-commonwealth, no less than the altruistic labours of the
workers, are adapted for the survival and dominance of the species. The
struggle for life may deal hardly with the individual, but it
results--to quote Darwin's well-known title--in "the preservation of
favoured races."
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--More has been written on bees, and especially on the
genus _Apis_, than on any other group of insects. The classical
observations of Reaumur _Memoires pour servir a l'histoire des
insectes_, vols. v., vi. (Paris, 1740-1742) and F. Huber's _Nouvelles
observations sur les abeilles_ (Geneve, 1792) will never be forgotten;
they have been matched in recent times by J.H. Fabre's _Souvenirs
entomologiques_ (Paris, 1879-1891); and M. Maeterlinck's poetic yet
scientific _La vie des abeilles_ (Paris, 1901). Among writers on the
solitary and parasitic species may be specially mentioned F. Smith,
_Hymenoptera in the British Museum_ (London, 1853-1859); H. Friese,
_Zool. Jahrb. Syst._, iv. (1891) J. Perez, _Actes Soc. Bordeaux_,
xlviii. (1895); and C. Verhoeff, _Zool. Jahrb. Syst._, vi. (1892). For
the social species we have valuable papers by E. Hoffer, _Mitt.
Naturwissen. Ver. Steiermark_, xxxi. (1881); H. von Jhering, _Zool.
Jahrb. Syst._, xix. (1903); and others. For recent controversy on
parthenogenesis in the hive bee, see J. Perez, _Ann. Sci. Nat. Zool._
(6), vii. (1878); F. Dickel, _Zool. Anz._, xxv. (1901), and _Anatom.
Anzeiger_, xix. (1902); A. Petrunkevich, _Zoolog. Jahrb. Anat._, xiv.
(1901); and A. Weismann, _Anatom. Anzeiger_, xviii. (1901). F.R.
Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping_ (London, 1885-1888), and T.W.
Cowan's _Honey Bee_ (2nd ed., 1904), are invaluable to the naturalist,
and contain extensive bibliographies of _Apis_. D. Sharp's summary in
the _Cambridge Natural History_, vol. vi., should be consulted for
further information on bees generally. British bees are described in
the catalogues of Smith, mentioned above, and by E. Saunders, _The
Hymenoptera of the British Islands_ (London, 1896). (G. H. C.)
BEE-KEEPING
Bee-keeping, or the cultivation of the honey-bee as a source of income
to those who practise it, is known to have existed from the most ancient
times. Poets, philosophers, historians and naturalists (among whom may
be mentioned Virgil, Aristotle, Cicero and Pliny) have eulogized the bee
as unique among insects, endowed by nature with wondrous gifts
beneficial to mankind in a greater degree than any other creature of
the insect world. We are told that some of these ancient scientists
passed years of their lives studying the wonders of bee-life, and left
accurate records of their observations, which on many points agree with
the investigations of later observers. As a forcible illustration of the
manner in which a colony of bees was recognized as the embodiment of
government by a chief or ruler, in the earliest times of which there is
any existing record, it may be mentioned that on the sarcophagus
containing the mummified remains of Mykerinos (now in the British Museum
and dating back 3633 years B.C.) will be found a hieroglyphic bee,(fig.
8) representing the king of Lower Egypt.
[Illustration: FIG. 8.--Sign of the king of Lower Egypt; from the coffin
of Mykerinos, 3633 B.C. (British Museum).]
Queen-rearing.
In dealing with the practical side of bee-keeping as now understood, it
may be said that, compared with the methods in vogue during the first
decade of the 19th century, or even within the memory of men still
living at the beginning of the 20th, it is as the modern locomotive to
the stagecoach of a previous generation. Almost everything connected
with bee-craft has been revolutionized, and apiculture, instead of being
classed with such homely rural occupations as that of the country
housewife who carries a few eggs weekly to the market-town in her
basket, is to-day regarded in many countries as a pursuit of
considerable importance. Remarkable progress has also been made in the
art of queen-rearing, and in improving the common or native bee by
judicious crossing with the best foreign races, selected mainly for
hardiness, working qualities and the prolific capacity of their queens.
American bee-breeders are conspicuous in this respect, extensive
apiaries being exclusively devoted to the business of rearing queens by
the thousand for sale and export.
On the European continent queen-rearing apiaries are plentiful, but less
attention is paid there to hybridizing than to keeping the respective
races pure. In England also, some bee-keepers include queen-rearing as
part of their business, while one large apiary on the south coast is
exclusively devoted to the rearing of queen bees on the latest
scientific system, and to breeding by selection from such races as are
most suited to the exceptional climatic conditions of the country.
Honey as food.
Extensive apiaries have been established on the American continent, some
containing from 2000 to 3500 colonies of bees, and in these honey is
harvested in hundreds of tons yearly. The magnitude of the bee industry
in the United States may be judged from the fact of a single bee-farmer
located in California having harvested from 150,000 lb. of honey in one
year from 2000 stocks of bees, and, as an instance of the enormous
weight of honey obtainable from good hives in that favoured region, the
same farmer secured 60,000 lb. of comb-honey in one season from his best
300 colonies. This is probably the maximum, and the hives were
necessarily located in separate apiaries some few miles apart in order
to avoid the evils of overstocking, but all in the midst of thousands of
acres of honey-yielding flowers. Results like the above compared with
those of the skeppist bee-keeper of former days, who was well pleased
with an average of 20 to 25 lb. per hive, may be regarded as wonderful,
but they are matters of fact. The consumption of honey as an article of
food has also largely increased of late years; a recent computation
shows that from 100 to 125 million lb. of honey, representing a money
value of from eight to ten million dollars, is consumed annually in the
United States alone. Many of the larger bee-farmers of the United States
of America and Canada harvest from 50,000 to 60,000 lb. of honey in a
single season, and some of them sell the whole crop direct to consumers.
State aid for bee-keeping.
It is a notable fact that in the United States, Canada, Australia, New
Zealand, and indeed all English-speaking countries outside the United
Kingdom, honey is far more extensively used than it is there as an
article of daily food. The natural result of this is that the trade in
honey is conducted, in those countries, on entirely different lines from
those followed in the British Isles, where honey production as an
occupation has, until quite recent years, been regarded as too
insignificant for official notice in any form. The value of the bee
industry is now recognized, however, by the British government as worthy
of state aid, in the promotion of technical instruction connected with
agriculture. On the American continent apiculture is officially
recognized by the respective states' governments; and by the federal
government at Washington it is taken into account as a section of the
Agricultural Department, with fully equipped experimental apiaries and
qualified professors engaged therein for educational work. In several
Canadian provinces also, the public funds are used in promoting the bee
industry in various ways, mainly in combating the bee-disease known as
"foul brood." In New Zealand the government of the colony has displayed
the most praiseworthy earnestness and vigour in promoting apiculture.
State-aided apiaries have been established under the supervision of a
skilled bee-keeper, who travels over the colony giving instruction in
practical bee-work at the public schools, and forming classes at various
centres where pupils are taught bee-keeping in all its branches.
Value of bees as fertilizers.
In Europe similar progress is observable; technical schools, with
well-equipped apiaries attached, are supported by the state, and in them
the science and practice of modern bee-keeping is taught free by
scientists and practical experts. Institutions of this kind have been
established in Germany, Russia, Switzerland and elsewhere, all tending
in the same direction, viz. the cultivation of the honey-bee as an
appreciable source of income to the farmer, the peasant cultivator, and
dwellers in districts where bee-forage is abundant and, if unvisited by
the bee, lies wasting its sweetness on the desert air. It may be safely
said that the value of the bee to the fruit-grower and the
market-gardener has been proved beyond dispute; and the technical
instruction now afforded by county councils in the rural districts of
England has an appreciable effect. In proof thereof, we may quote the
case of an extensive grower in the midland counties--sending fruit to
the London market in tons--whose crop of gooseberries increased nearly
fourfold after establishing a number of stocks of bees in close
proximity to the gooseberry bushes. The fruit orchards and raspberry
fields of Kent are also known to be greatly benefited by the numerous
colonies of bees owned by more than 3000 bee-keepers in the county. The
important part played by the bee in the economy of nature as a
fertilizer is shown in fig. 9.
[Illustration: FIG. 9.--A, Raspberry (_Rubus idaeus_, order _Rosaceae_),
being fertilized. B, Cross section.
A, Flower.
p, p, Petals.
a, a, Anthers.
s, Stigma.
no, Nectary openings.
nc, Nectar cells.
D, Drupels.
B, Section through core, or torus (C) and drupels (D).
ud, Unfertilized drupel.
ws, Withered stigma.
(From Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping, Scientific and Practical_.)]
Bee-keepers' associations.
Bee and honey shows.
Honey labels.
In the United Kingdom the prevailing conditions, climatic and otherwise,
with regard to apiculture--as well as the lack of sufficient natural
bee-forage for large apiaries--are such as to preclude the possibility
of establishing apiaries on a scale comparable with those located in
less confined lands. On the other hand, even in England the value of
bee-keeping is worthy of recognition as a minor industry connected with
such items of agriculture as fruit-growing, market-gardening or
poultry-raising. The fact that British honey is second to none for
quality, and that the British market is eagerly sought by the
bee-keepers of other nationalities, has of late impressed itself on the
minds of thinking men. Moreover, their views are confirmed by the
constant references to bees and the profits obtainable from bee-keeping
in the leading papers on all sides. This newly-aroused interest in the
subject is no doubt to a large extent fostered by the grants in aid of
technical instruction afforded by county councils in rural districts.
The British Bee-keepers' Association (instituted in 1874) has been
untiring in its efforts to raise the standard of efficiency among those
who are desirous of qualifying as experts and teachers of bee-keeping on
modern methods. This body had for its first president the distinguished
naturalist Sir John Lubbock (Lord Avebury). Subsequently the baroness
Burdett-Coutts accepted the office in the year 1878, and was re-elected
annually until her death in 1906. During this time she presided at its
meetings and took an active part in its work, until advancing years
prevented her attendance, but her interest in the welfare of the
association was maintained to the last. Branch societies of bee-keepers
were established throughout the English counties, mainly by the efforts
of the parent body in London, with the object of securing co-operation
in promoting the sale of honey, and showing the most modern methods of
producing it in its most attractive form at exhibitions held for the
purpose. Nearly the whole of these county societies affiliated with the
central association, paying an affiliation fee yearly, and receiving in
return the silver medal, bronze medal and certificate of the
association, to be offered as prizes for competition at the annual
county shows. Other advantages are given in connexion with the
qualifying of experts, &c., while nearly all the county associations in
the United Kingdom employ qualified men who visit members in spring and
autumn for the purpose of examining hives and giving advice on bee
management to those needing it. Another advantage of membership is the
use of a "county label" for affixing to each section of honey in comb,
or jar of extracted honey, offered for sale by members. These labels are
numbered consecutively, and thus afford a guarantee of the genuineness
and quality of the honey, the label enabling purchasers to trace the
producer if needed. The British Bee-keepers' Association is an entirely
philanthropic body, the only object of its members being to promote all
that is good in British bee-keeping, and to "teach humanity to that
industrious little labourer, the honey-bee." Bee-appliance manufacturers
are not eligible for membership of its council, nor are those who make
bee-keeping their main business; thus no professional jealousies can
possibly arise. In this respect the association appears to stand alone
among the bee-keepers' societies of the world. There are many equally
beneficial societies, framed on different lines, existing in Germany,
France, Russia and Switzerland, but they are mainly co-operative bodies
instituted for the general benefit of members, who are without exception
either bee-keepers on a more or less extensive scale, or scientists
interested in the study of insect life.
The bee-keepers' associations of the United States, Canada and most of
the British colonies, are--like those last mentioned above--formed for
the sole and laudable purpose of promoting the business interests of
their members, the latter being either bee-farmers or bee-appliance
manufacturers. Thus they make no pretension of any but business
discussions at their conferences, and much benefit to all concerned
follows as a matter of course. In fact, we find enthusiastic bee-men and
women travelling several hundreds of miles and devoting time, money and
labour in attending conferences of bee-keepers in America, while the
proceedings usually last for several days and are largely attended. The
extent of the industry compared with that of Great Britain is so great
that it fully accounts for the difference in procedure of the respective
associations.
[Illustration: FIG 10.--"1-lb. section" wooden box for holding
Comb-honey.
(Redrawn from the _A B C of Bee Culture_, published by the A. I. Root
Co. Medina, Ohio, U.S.A.) ]
The bee-appliance trade.
As a natural consequence of this activity, the trade in bee-appliance
making has assumed enormous proportions in the United States, where
extensive factories have been established; one firm--employing over 500
hands, and using electric-power machinery of the most modern type--being
devoted entirely to the manufacture of bee-goods and apiarian
requisites. From this establishment alone the yearly output is about
25,000 bee-hives, and upwards of 100 millions of the small wooden boxes
used for holding comb-honey. The most generally approved form of this
box is known as the "1-lb. section," made from a strip of wood 1/2 in.
thick, 2 in. wide, and of such length that when folded by joining the
morticed and tenoned ends A B (fig. 10) it forms the section of box C,
measuring 4-1/4" X 4-1/2" X 2" when complete, and holds about 1 lb. of
comb-honey when filled by the bees and ready for table use. The V-shaped
groove D (cut across and partly through the wood) shows the joint when
in the flat, and E the same joint when closed for use. All the section
boxes used in the United Kingdom are made in the U.S.A or in Canada from
the timber known as basswood, no native wood being suitable for the
purpose.
[Illustration: FIG. 11.-Straw skep in section, showing arrangement of
Combs
A, Vertical section.
fb, Floor board.
e, Entrance.
br, Brood
p, Pollen.
h, Honey.
fh, Feeding hole.
bs, bs, Bee spaces.
B, Horizontal section.
sk, Skep-side.
c, c, Combs.
sc, sc, Store combs.
bs, bs, Bee spaces.
(from Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping, Scientific and Practical_.)]
The straw skep.
The movable-frame hive.
Huber's observatory hive.
_Development of the Movable-frame Hive_--The dome-shaped straw skep of
our forefathers may be regarded as the typical bee-hive of all time and
of all civilized countries; indeed, it may with truth be said that as a
healthy and convenient home for the honey-bee it has no equal. A swarm
of bees hived in a straw skep, the picturesque little domicile known the
world over as the personification of industry, will furnish their home
with waxen combs in form and shape so admirably adapted to their
requirements as to need no improvement by man. Why the circular form was
chosen for the skep need not be inquired into, beyond saying that its
shape conforms to that of a swarm, as the bees usually hang clustered on
the branch of a neighbouring tree or bush after issuing from the parent
hive. Fig 11 shows a straw skep in section, and explains itself as
illustrating the admirable way in which the bees furnish their dwelling.
The vertical section (A) shows the lower portion of the combs devoted to
brood-rearing, the higher and thicker combs being reserved for honey,
and midway between the brood and food is stored the pollen required for
mixing with honey in feeding the larvae. It will be seen how well the
upper part of the combs are fitted for bearing the weight of stores they
contain, and how the lower portion allows the bees to cluster around
the tender larvae and thus maintain the warmth necessary during its
metamorphosis from the egg to the perfect insect. The horizontal section
(B) with equal clearness demonstrates the bee's ingenuity in economizing
space, showing how the outer combs are used exclusively for stores, and,
as such, may be built of varying thickness as more or less storage room
is required. The straw skep has, however, the irredeemable fault of
fixed combs, and the gradual development of the movable-frame hive of
today may be said to have first appeared in 1789 with the leaf-hive of
Huber, so called from its opening like the leaves of a book. Prior to
that date wooden box-hives of various shapes had been adopted by
advanced bee-masters anxious to increase their output of honey, and by
enthusiastic naturalists desirous of studying and investigating the
wonders of bee-life apart from the utilitarian standpoint. Foremost
among the latter was the distinguished Swiss naturalist and bee-keeper,
Francois Huber, who was led to construct the leaf-hive bearing his name
after experimenting with a single comb observatory hive recommended by
Reaumur. Huber found that although he could induce swarms to occupy the
glass-sided single frame advised by Reaumur, if the frame was fitted
with ready-built pieces of comb patched together before hiving the
swarm, the experiment was successful, while if left to themselves the
bees built small combs across the space between the sheets of glass, and
the desired inspection from the outside was thus rendered impossible. He
also gathered that the abnormal conditions forced upon the bees by a
ready-built single comb might so turn aside their natural instincts as
to render his investigations less trustworthy than if conducted under
perfectly natural conditions; so, in order to remove all doubt, he
decided to have a series of wooden frames made, measuring 12 in. sq.,
each of rather more than the ordinary width allowed for brood-combs.
These frames were numbered consecutively 1 to 12, and hinged together as
shown in fig. 12 (h, A). In this way the frames of comb could be opened
for inspection like a book, while when closed the bees clustered
together as in an ordinary hive. Ten of these frames had a small piece
of comb fixed to the top-bar in each, supported (temporarily) by a thin
lath wedged up with pegs at side, the latter being removed when the comb
had been made secure by the bees. When closed, the ten frames, together
with the two outside ones (fitted with squares of glass for inspection),
which represent the covers of the book, were tied together with a couple
of stout strings. In a subsequent form of the same hive Huber was
enabled--with the help of very long thumb-screws at each side (fig.
13)--to raise up any frame between two sheets of glass which confined
the bees and allowed him to study the process of comb-building better
than any hive we know of today. By means of the leaf-hive and using the
entrances (fig. 12, e, e, A) Huber made artificial swarms by dividing
and the use of division-boards, though not in quite the same fashion as
is practised at the present day. On the other hand, it must be admitted
that Huber's hive was defective in many respects; the parting of each
frame, thus letting loose the whole colony, caused much trouble at
times, but it remained the only movable-comb hive till 1838, when Dr
Dzierzon--whose theory of parthenogenesis has made his name
famous--devised a box-hive with a loose top-bar on which the bees built
their combs and a movable side or door, by means of which the frames
could be lifted out for inspection. This improvement was at once
appreciated, and in the year 1852 Baron Berlepsch added side-bars and a
bottom-bar, thus completing the movable frame.
[Illustration: FIG. 12.--Huber's book or leaf hive.
A, Book hive.
e, e, Entrances.
s, s, Side leaves.
h, Hinges.
B, Side view of frame or leaf.
tb, Top-bar
c, Comb.
p, p, Pegs.
C, Part of bin, cross section, lettering as before.
(From Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping, Scientific and Practical_.)]
[Illustration: FIG. 13.-Huber's bar-hive, showing how comb is built, cb,
Comb bar; g, g, glass sheets; s, s, screws; e, entrance
(From Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping, Scientific and Practical_.) ]
Laagstroth's hive.
About the same time the Rev. L.L. Langstroth was experimenting on the
same lines in America, and in 1852 his important invention was made
known, giving to the world of bee-keepers a movable frame which in its
most important details will never be excelled. We refer to the respective
distances left between the side-bars and hive walls on each side, and
between the lower edge of the bottom-bars and the floor-board.
Langstroth, in his measurements, hit upon the happy mean which keeps bees
from propolizing or fastening the frames to the hive body, as they
assuredly would do if sufficient space had not been allowed for free
passage round the side-bars; it is equally certain that if too much space
had been provided, they would fill it with comb and thus render the frame
immovable. In addition to these benefits, Langstroth's frame and hive
possessed the enormous advantage over Dzierzon's of being manipulated
from above, so that any single frame could be raised for inspection
without disturbing the others. Langstroth's space-measurements have
remained practically unaltered notwithstanding the many improvements in
hive-making, and in the various sizes of movable frames, since introduced
and used in different parts of the world.
Size of frames in the U.S.A.
In the United States of America Langstroth's frame and hive are the
acknowledged "standards" among the great body of bee-keepers, although
about a dozen different frames, varying more or less in size, have their
adherents. Among these may be named the American, Adair, Danzenbaker,
Gallup, Heddon, Langstroth and Quinby. Three of these, the American,
Adair and Gallup, may be termed square frames, the others being oblong,
but the latter shape appears to possess the most all-round advantages to
the modern bee-keeper. Amid the different climatic conditions of so vast
a continent as America, variation in size, and in the capacity of frames
used, is in some measure accounted for.
[Illustration: FIG. 14.--Standard Frame.]
British "Standard" frame.
In the British Isles, though the conditions are variable enough, they
are less extreme, and, fortunately for those engaged in the pursuit,
only one size of frame is acknowledged by the great majority of
bee-keepers, viz. the British Bee-keepers' Association "Standard" (fig.
14). This frame, the outside measurement of which is 14 by 8-1/2 in.,
was the outcome of deliberations extending over a considerable time on
the part of a committee of well-known bee-keepers, specially appointed
in 1882 to consider the matter. In this way, whatever type or form of
hive is used, the frames are interchangeable. Differences in view may,
and do, exist regarding the thickness of the wood used in frame-making,
but the _outside_ measurement never varies. Notwithstanding this fact,
the advancement of apiculture and the continuous development of the
modern frame-hive and methods of working have proceeded with such
rapidity, both in England and in America, that hives and appliances used
prior to 1885 are now obsolete.
[Illustration: FIG. 15.--Langstroth Hive.
(Redrawn from the _A B C of Bee-Culture_, published by the A. I. Root
Co., Medina, Ohio, U.S.A.)]
Winter cellars for bees.
It may, therefore, be useful to compare the progress made in the United
States of America and in Great Britain in order to show that, while the
industry is incomparably larger and of more importance in America and
Canada than in Great Britain, British bee-keepers have been abreast of
the times in all things apicultural. The original Langstroth hive was
single-walled, held ten frames (size 17-3/4 by 9 in.), and had a deep
roof, made to cover a case of small honey boxes like the sections now in
use; but the cumbersome projecting porch and sides, made to support the
roof, are now dispensed with, and the number of frames reduced to eight.
Although various modifications have since been made in minor
details--all tending to improvement--its main features are unaltered.
The typical hive of America is the _improved_ Langstroth (fig. 15),
which has no other covering for the frame tops but a flat roof-board
allowing 1/4 in. space between the roof and top-bars for bees to pass
from frame to frame. Consequently, on the roof being raised the bees can
take wing if not prevented from doing so. This feature finds no favour
with British bee-keepers, nevertheless the "improved Langstroth" is a
useful and simple hive, moderate in price, and no doubt efficient, but
not suitable for bees wintered on their summer stands, as nearly all
hives are in Great Britain. American bee-keepers, therefore, find it
necessary to provide underground cellars, into which the bees are
carried in the fall of each year, remaining there till work begins in
the following spring. Those among them who cannot, for various reasons,
adopt the cellar-wintering plan are obliged to provide what are termed
"chaff-covers" for protecting their bees in winter. Of late years they
have also introduced, as an improvement, the plan long followed in
England of using double-walled chaff-packed hives. The difference here
is that packing is now dispensed with, it being found that bees winter
equally well with an outer case giving 1-1/2 in. of free space on all
sides of the hive proper, but with no packing in between. Thus no change
is needed in winter or summer, the air-space protecting the bees from
cold in winter and heat in summer. Another point of difference between
the English and American hive is the roof, which being gable-shaped in
the former allows warm packing to be placed directly on the frame tops,
so that the bees are covered in when the roof is removed and may be
examined or fed with very little disturbance. Again, the American hive
is, as a general rule, set close down on the ground, while stands or
short legs are invariably used in Great Britain. One of the best-known
hives in England is that known as the W.B.C. hive, devised in 1890 by W.
Broughton Carr.
[Illustration: FIG. 16.--Exterior, W.B.C. Hive.]
Figs. 16 and 17 explain its construction and, as will be seen, it is
equally suitable when working for comb or for extracted honey.
[Illustration: FIG. 17.--Interior, W.B.C. Hive.]
Honey extractors.
Various causes have contributed to the development of the modern hive,
the most important of which are the improvements in methods of
extracting honey from combs, and in the manufacture of comb-foundation.
Regarding the first of these, it cannot be said that the honey
extractor, even in its latest form, differs very much from the original
machine (fig. 18) invented by Major Hruschka, an officer in the Italian
army, who in later life became an enthusiastic apiculturist. Hruschka's
extractor, first brought to public notice in 1865, may be said to have
revolutionized the bee-industry as a business. It enabled the honey
producer to increase his output considerably by extracting honey from
the cells in most cleanly fashion without damaging the combs, and in a
fraction of the time previously occupied in the draining, heating and
squeezing process. At the same time the combs were preserved for
refilling by the bees, in lieu of melting them down for wax. The
principle of the honey extractor (throwing the liquid honey out of the
cells by centrifugal force) was discovered quite by accident. Major
Hruschka's little son chanced to have in his hand a bit of unsealed
comb-honey in a basket to which was attached a piece of string, and, as
the boy playfully whirled the basket round in the air, his father
noticed a few drops of honey, thrown out of the comb by the centrifugal
force employed to keep the basket suspended. The value of the idea at
once struck him, he set to work on utilizing the principle involved, and
ere long had constructed a machine admirably adapted to serve its
purpose. Since that time changes, of more or less value, have been
introduced to meet present-day requirements. One of the first to take
advantage of Hruschka's invention was Mr A. I. Root, who in 1869
perfected a machine on similar lines to the Hruschka one but embodying
various improvements. This appliance, known as the "Novice Honey
Extractor," became very popular in the United States of America, but it
had the fault of wasting time in removing the combs for reversing after
one side had been emptied of its contents. A simple form of machine for
extracting honey by centrifugal force was brought to notice in England
in 1875, and was soon improved upon, as will be seen in fig. 19, which
shows a section of one of the best English machines at that time.
Various plans were tried in America to improve on the "Novice" machine,
and Mr T.W. Cowan, who was experimenting in the same direction in
England, invented in the year 1875 a machine called the "Rapid," in
which, the combs were reversed without removal of the cages (fig. 20).
The frame-cases--wired on both sides--are hung at the angles of a
revolving ring of iron, and the reversing process is so simple and
effective that the "Cowan" reversible frame has been adopted in all the
best machines both in Great Britain and in America.
[Illustration: FIG. 18.--Hruschka Extractor. (Redrawn from _The A B C of
Bee Culture_, published by the A. I. Root Co, Medina, Ohio, U.S.A.)]
[Illustration: FIG. 19.--Diagram of the Raynor Extractor.
A, Section of extractor.
fr, Fixing rail
ffr, Frame for cage.
wb, Metal webbing.
wn, Wire netting.
co, Comb
w, Wire bottom.
p, Pivot.
c, Stiffening cone.
cb, Coned bottom.
gt, Gutter.
st, Syrup tap.
C, Perpendicular section of side of cage enlarged.
oc, Outer casing
wb, Metal webbing
wn, Wire netting
(From Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping, Scientific and Practical._)
The latest form of honey extractor used in America is that known as the
"Four-frame Cowan." Fig. 21 shows the working part or inside of the
appliance. In this, and indeed in all extractors used in large apiaries,
the "Cowan" or reversible frame principle is used. Each of the four
cages in which the combs are placed is swung on a pivot attached to the
side, and when the outer faces of the combs are emptied the cages are
reversed without removal from the machine for emptying the opposite
sides of combs. The further development of the honey extractor has of
late been limited to an increase in the size of machine used, in order
to save time and manual labour, and thus meet the requirements of the
largest honey producers, who extract honey by the car load. Some of the
largest machines--propelled by motor power--are capable of taking eight
or more frames at one time. It may also be claimed for the honey
extractor that it does away with the objection entertained by many
persons to the use of honey, by enabling the apiarist to remove his
produce from the honey-combs in its purest form untainted by crushed
brood and untouched by hand.
[Illustration: FIG. 20.--Cowan's rapid Extractor.]
[Illustration: FIG. 21.--Cowan's four-frame Extractor; interior.
(Redrawn from _The A B C of Bee Culture_, published by the A. I. Root
Co, Medina, Ohio, U.S.A.)]
Comb foundation.
Next in importance, to bee-keepers, is the enormous advance made in late
years through the invention of a machine for manufacturing the impressed
wax sheets known as "comb foundation," aptly so named, because upon it
the bees build the cells wherein they store their food. We need not
dwell upon the evolution from the crude idea, which first took form in
the endeavour to compel bees to build straight combs in a given
direction by offering them a guiding line of wax along the under side of
each top-bar of the frame in which the combs were built; but we may
glance at the more important improvements which gradually developed as
time went on. In 1843 a German bee-keeper, Krechner by name, conceived
the idea of first dipping fine linen into molten wax, then pressing the
sheets so made between rollers, and thus forming a waxen midrib on which
the bees would build their combs. This experiment was partially
successful, but the instinctive dislike of bees to anything of a fibrous
nature caused them completely to spoil their work of comb-building in
the endeavour to tear or gnaw away the linen threads whenever they got
in touch with them. In 1857 Mehring (also a German) made a further
advance by the use of wooden moulds for casting sheets of wax impressed
with the hexagonal form of the bee-cell. These sheets were readily
accepted by the bees, and afterwards plates cast from metal were
employed, with so good a result as to give to the bees as perfect a
midrib as that of natural comb with the deep cell walls cut away. Fig.
22 shows a portion of one of these metal plates with worker-cells of
natural size, i.e. five cells to the inch. Thus Mehring is justly
claimed as the originator of comb-foundation, though the value of his
invention was less eagerly taken advantage of even in Germany than its
merits deserved. Probably it was ahead of the times, for not until
nearly twenty years later was any prominence given to it, when Samuel
Wagner, founder and editor of the _American Bee Journal_, became
impressed with Mehring's invention and warmly advocated it in his paper.
Mr Wagner first conceived the idea of adding slightly raised side walls
to the hexagonal outlines of the cells, by means of which the bees are
supplied with the material for building out one-half or more of the
complete cell walls or sides. The manifest advantage of this was at once
realized by practical American apiarists as saving labour to the bees
and money to the bee-keeper. One of the first to recognize its value was
Mr A I. Root, of Medina, Ohio, who suggested the substitution of
embossed rollers in lieu of flat plates, in order to increase the output
of foundation and lessen its cost to the bee-keeper. He lost no time in
giving practical shape to his views, and mainly through the inventive
genius of a skilled machinist (Mr A. Washburn) the A. I. Root Co.
constructed a roller press (fig 23) for producing foundation in sheets.
This form of machine came into extensive use in the United States of
America and afterwards in Great Britain. The first roller press was made
by the A.I. Root Co. and imported by Mr William Raitt, a Scottish
bee-keeper of repute in Perthshire, N.B. In all roller machines used at
that time the plain sheets of wax were first made by the "dipping"
process, i.e. by repeated dippings of damped boards in molten wax (kept
in liquid condition in tanks immersed in hot water) until the sheet was
of suitable thickness for the purpose. The prepared sheets were then
passed through the rollers, and after being cut out and trimmed were
ready for use.
[Illustration: FIG. 22.--Portion of a type-metal plate--i.e. form of
Comb Midrib (five cells to the inch). (From Cheshire's _Bees and
Bee-keeping Scientific and Practical_.)]
Owing to the enormous demand for comb-foundation at that time various
devices were tried with the view of securing (1) more rapid production,
and (2) a foundation thin enough to be used in surplus chambers when
working for comb-honey intended for table use. Foremost among the able
men who experimented in this latter direction was Mr F.B. Weed, a
skilful American machinist, who, after some years of strenuous effort,
succeeded in devising and perfecting special rollers and dies, by the
use of which foundation was produced with a midrib so thin as to compare
favourably with natural comb built by the bees. "Dipping," however,
proved not only a stumbling-block to speed but to the production of
continuous sheets of wax; and in the end Mr Weed, acting in concert with
Mr A.I. Root (who placed the resources of his enormous factory at his
disposal), devised and perfected machinery--driven by motor power--for
manufacturing foundation by what is known as the "Weed" process. By this
process "dipping" is abolished, and in its latest form sheets of wax of
any length are produced, passed between engraved rollers 6 in in
diameter, cut to given lengths, trimmed, counted and paper-tissued ready
for packing, at a rate of speed previously undreamt of.
[Illustration: FIG. 23.--Foundation Machine.
(From Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping, Scientific and Practical_.)]
_Practical Management of Bees._--Among the world of insects the
honey-bee stands pre-eminent as the most serviceable to mankind; from
the day on which the little labourer leaves its home for the first time
in search of food, its mission is undoubtedly useful. Launched upon an
unknown world, and guided by unerring instinct to the very flowers it
seeks, the bee fertilizes fruit and flowers while winging its happy
flight among the blossoms, gathering pollen for the nurslings of its own
home and honey for the use of man. Nothing seems to be lost, nor can any
part of the bee's work be accounted labour in vain; the very wax from
which the insect builds the store-combs for its food and the cells in
which its young are hatched and reared is valuable to mankind in many
ways, and is regarded today no less than in the past ages as an
important commercial product. The hive bee is, moreover, the only insect
known to be capable of domestication, so far as labouring under the
direct control of the bee-master is concerned, its habits being
admirably adapted for embodying human methods of working for profit in
our present-day life.
In dealing with the practical side of apiculture it will not be
necessary to do more than mention the salient points to be considered by
those desirous of acquiring more complete knowledge of the subject.
Authoritative text-books specially written for the guidance of
bee-keepers are numerous and cheap, and on no account should any one
engage in an attempt to manage bees on modern lines without a careful
perusal of one or more of these. Bearing this in mind the reader will
understand that so much of the natural history of the honey-bee as is
necessary for elucidating the practical part of our subject may be
comprised in (1) the life of the insect, (2) its mission in life, and
(3) utilizing to the utmost the brief period during which it can labour
before being worn out with toil.
[Illustration: FIG. 24.-Hive bee (_Apis mellafica_). a, Worker; b,
queen; c, drone.
(From Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping, Scientific and Practical_.)]
Sex of bees.
Loss of queens.
A prosperous bee-colony managed on modern lines will in the height of
summer consist of three kinds of bees: a queen or mother-bee, a certain
number of drones, and from 80,000 to 100,000 workers. With regard to
sex, the queen is a fully-developed female, the drones are males and the
workers may be termed neuters or partially developed females. These last
possess ovaries like the queen, but shrunken and aborted so as to render
the insect normally incapable of egg-production. The relative importance
of the three kinds of bees, differs greatly in a degree and in somewhat
curious fashion. For instance, the queen (or "king" of the hives as it
was termed by our forefathers) is of paramount importance at certain
seasons, her death or disablement during the period when the male
element is absent meaning extinction of the whole colony. Fecundation
would under such conditions be impossible, and without this the eggs of
a resultant queen will produce nothing but drones. During the summer
season, however (from May to July), when drones are abundant, the loss
of a queen is of comparatively little moment, as the workers can
transform eggs (or young larvae not more than three days old), which
would in the ordinary course produce worker bees, into fully-developed
queens, capable of fulfilling all the maternal duties of a mother-bee.
The value of this wonderful provision of nature to the bee-keeper of
today may be estimated from the fact that bees managed according to
modern methods are necessarily subject to so much manipulating or
handling, that fatal accidents are as likely to happen in bee life as
among human beings.
Authorities differ with regard to the age during which the queen bee is
useful to the bee-keeper who works for profit. Under normal conditions
the insect will live for three, four or sometimes five years, but the
stimulation given together with the high-pressure system followed in
modern bee-management, exhausts the period of her greatest fecundity in
two years, so that queens are usually superseded after their second
season has expired and egg-production gradually decreases. This can
hardly cause wonder if it is borne in mind that for many weeks during
the height of the season a prolific queen will deposit eggs at the rate
of from two to three thousand every twenty-four hours.
The drone.
Drones (or male bees) are more or less numerous in hives according to
the skill of the bee-keeper in limiting their production. It is admitted
by those best able to judge that the proportion of about a hundred
drones in each hive is conducive to the prosperity of the colony, but
beyond that number they are worse than useless, being non-producers and
heavy consumers. Thus in times of scarcity, which are not infrequent
during the early part of the season, they become a heavy tax upon the
food-supply of the colony at the critical period when brood-rearing is
accelerated by an abundance of stores, while shortness of food means a
falling-off in egg-production. The modern bee-keeper, therefore, allows
just so much drone comb in the hive as will produce a sufficient number
of drones to ensure queen-mating, while affording to the bees the
satisfaction of dwelling in a home equipped according to natural
conditions, and containing all the elements necessary to bee-life. The
action of the bees themselves makes this point clear, for when the
season of mating is past the drone is no longer needed, the providing of
winter stores taking first place in the economy of the hive. So long as
honey is being gathered in plenty drones are tolerated, but no sooner
does the honey harvest show signs of being over than they are
mercilessly killed and cast out of the hive by the workers, after a
brief idle life of about four months' duration. Thus the "lazy yawning
drone," as Shakespeare puts it, has a short shrift when his usefulness
to the community is ended.
The worker-bee.
Longevity in bees.
Finally we have the aptly named worker-bee, on whom devolves the entire
labour of the colony. The worker-bee is incapable of egg-production and
can therefore take no part in the perpetuation of its species, so that
individually its value to the community is infinitesimal. Yet it forms
an item in a commonwealth, the members of which are in all respects
equally well endowed. They are in turn skilled scientists, architects,
builders, artisans, labourers and even scavengers; but collectively they
are the rulers on whom the colony depends for the wonderful condition of
law and order which has made the bee-community a model of good
government for all mankind. Then so far as regards longevity, the period
of a worker-bee's existence is not measured by numbering its days but
simply by wear and tear, the marvellous intricacy and wonderful
perfection of its framework being so delicate in construction that after
six or seven weeks of strenuous toil, such as the bee undergoes in
summer time, the little creature's labour is ended by a natural death.
On the other hand, worker-bees hatched in the autumn will seven months
later be strong with the vigour of lusty youth, able to take their full
share in the labour of the hive for six weeks or more in the early
spring, which is the most critical period in the colony's existence;
hence the value to the apiarist of bees hatched in the autumn.
The mission of the worker-bee is _work_; not so much for itself as for
the younger members of the community to which it belongs. We cannot
claim for it the virtue of strict honesty with regard to the stranger,
but for its own "kith and kin" it is a model of socialism in an ideal
form, possessing nothing of its own yet toiling unceasingly for the good
of all. The increasing warmth of each recurring spring finds the bee
awake, and full of eagerness to be up and doing; its sole mission being
apparently to accomplish as much work as possible while life lasts. The
earliest pollen is sought out from far and near, and has its immediate
effect upon the mother bee of the colony. If healthy and young she
begins egg-laying at once, and brood-rearing proceeds at an
ever-increasing rate as each week passes, until the hive is brimming
over with bees in time for the first honey flow. Then comes the almost
human foresight with which the bee prevents the inevitable chaos created
by an overcrowded home. There is no cell-room either for storing the
abundant supply of food constantly being brought in, or for the
thousands of eggs which a prolific queen will produce daily as a
consequence of general prosperity; therefore unless help comes from
without an exodus is prepared for, and what is known as "swarming" takes
place.
Swarming.
Hiving swarms.
It would be difficult to imagine anything more exhilarating to a
beginner in bee-keeping than the sight of his first hive in the act of
swarming. The little creatures are seen rushing in frantic haste from
the hive like a living stream, filling the air with ever-increasing
thousands of bees on the wing. The incoming workers returning
pollen-laden from the fields, carried away by the prevailing excitement,
do not stop to unload their burdens in the old home, but join the
enthusiastic emigrants, tumbling over each other pell-mell in the
outrush; among them the queen of the colony will in due course have
taken her place, bound like her children for a new home. It soon becomes
apparent to the onlooker when the queen has joined the flying multitude
of bees in the air, for they are seen to be closing up their ranks, and
in a few moments begin to form a solid cluster, usually on the branch of
a small tree or bush close to the ground. When this stage of swarming is
reached the bee-keeper has but to take his hiving skep, hold it under
the swarm, and shake the bees into it, preparatory to transferring them
into a frame-hive already prepared for their reception. The process of
hiving a swarm is very simple and need not occupy many moments of time
under ordinary conditions, but so many unlooked-for contingencies may
arise that the apiarist would do well to prepare himself beforehand by
carefully reading the directions in his text-book.
[Illustration: FIG. 25.--Honeycomb, Metamorphoses of the Honey Bee.
(From Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping, Scientific and Practical_.)]
The illustration given in fig. 25 will serve more readily than words to
enlighten the would-be bee-keeper. It shows a portion of honeycomb
(natural size) not precisely as it appears when the frame containing it
is lifted out of the hive, but as would be seen on two or more combs in
the same hive, namely, the various cells built for--and occupied
by--queens, drones and workers; also the larvae or grubs in the various
stages of transformation from egg to perfect insect, with the latter
biting their way out of sealed cells. It also shows sealed honey and
pollen in cells, &c. To familiarize himself with the various objects
depicted, all of which are drawn from nature, will not only help the
reader to understand the different phases of bee-life during the
swarming season, but tend to increase the interest of beginners in the
pursuit. "Early drones, early swarms" was the ancient bee-man's
favourite adage, and the skilled apiarist of to-day experiences the
same pleasurable thrill as did the skeppist of old at the sight of the
first drone of the year, which betokens an early swarm. As the drones
increase in number queen-cells are formed, unless steps be taken to turn
aside the swarming impulse by affording additional room beforehand in
the hive. The above brief outline of the guiding principles of natural
swarming is merely intended as introductory to the fuller information
given in a good text-book.
Bee-forage in U.S.A.
_Management of an Apiary._--The main consideration in establishing an
apiary is to secure a favourable location, which means a place where
honey of good marketable quality may be gathered from the bee-forage
growing around without any planting on the part of the bee-keeper
himself. It is impossible to deal here with the varying conditions under
which apiculture is carried on in all parts of the world, but, as a
rule, the same principle applies everywhere. The bee industry prospers
greatly in America, where amid the vast stretches of mountain and canyon
in California the bee-forage extends for miles without a break, and the
climatic conditions are so generally favourable as to reduce to a
minimum the chances of the honey crop failing through adverse weather.
The bee-keeper's object is to utilize to the utmost the brief space of a
worker-bee's life in summer, by adopting the best methods in vogue for
building up stocks to full strength before the honey-gathering time
begins, and preparing for it by the exercise of skill and intelligence
in carrying out this work.
Value of pollen.
The queen of bee-plants.
In the United Kingdom there is a difference of several weeks in the
honey season between north and south. Swarming usually begins in May in
the south of England, and in mid-July in the north of Scotland, the
issue of swarms coinciding with the early part of the main honey flow.
The weather is naturally more precarious in autumn than earlier in the
year, and chances of success proportionately smaller for northern
bee-men, but the disadvantage to the latter is more than compensated for
by the heather season, which extends well into September. With regard to
the British bee-keeper located in the south, the early fruit crop is
what concerns him most, and where pollen (the fertilizing dust of
flowers) is plentiful his bees will make steady progress. If pollen is
scarce, a substitute in the form of either pea-meal or wheaten flour
must be supplied to the bees, as brood-rearing cannot make headway
without the nitrogenous element indispensable in the food on which the
young are reared. But the main honey-crop of both north and south is
gathered from the various trifoliums, among which the white Dutch or
common clover (_Trifolium repens_) is acknowledged to be the most
important honey-producing plant wherever it grows. In the United States,
Canada, Australia, New Zealand and in many other parts of the world
honey of the finest quality is obtained from this "queen of bee-plants,"
and in lesser degree from other clovers such as sainfoin, alsike (a
hybrid clover), trefoil, &c.
British and American methods.
Before undertaking the management of a modern apiary, the bee-keeper
should possess a certain amount of aptitude for the pursuit, without
which it is hardly possible to succeed. He must also acquire the ability
to handle bees judiciously and well under all imaginable conditions. In
doing this it is needful to remember that bees resent outside
interference with either their work or their hives, and will resolutely
defend themselves when aroused even at the cost of life itself.
Experience has also proved that, when alarmed, bees instinctively begin
to fill their honey-sacs with food from the nearest store-cells as a
safeguard against contingencies, and when so provided they are more
amenable to interference. The bee-keeper, therefore, by the judicious
application of a little smoke from smouldering fuel, blown into the hive
by means of an appliance known as a bee-smoker, alarms the bees and is
thus able to manipulate the frames of comb with ease and almost no
disturbance. The smoker (fig. 26) devised by T.F. Bingham of Farwell,
Michigan, U.S.A., is the one most used in America and in the United
Kingdom. No other protection is needed beyond a bee-veil of fine black
net, which slipped over a wide-brimmed straw hat protects the face from
stings when working among bees; as experience is gained the veil is not
always used. The man who is hasty and nervous in temperament, who fears
an occasional sting, and resents the same by viciously killing the bee
that inflicts it will rarely make a good apiarist. The methods of
handling bees vary in different countries, this being in a great measure
accounted for by the number of hives kept. Very few apiaries in the
United Kingdom contain more than a hundred hives; consequently the
British bee-keeper has no need for employing the forceful or "hustling"
methods found necessary in America, where the honey-crop is gathered in
car-loads and the hives numbered by thousands. It naturally follows that
bee-life is there regarded very slightly by comparison, and the
bee-garden in England becomes the "bee-yard" in America, where the
apiarist when at work must thoroughly protect himself from being stung,
and, safe in his immunity from damage, cares little for bee-life in
getting through his task, the loss of a few hundred bees being
considered of no account. There are, however, other reasons, apart from
humanity, to account for the difference in handling bees as advocated in
the United Kingdom. The great majority of apiaries owned by British
bee-keepers are located in close proximity to neighbours; consequently a
serious upset among the bees would in many cases involve an amount of
trouble which should if possible be avoided; therefore quietness and the
exercise of care when manipulating are always recommended by teachers,
and practised by those who wisely take their lessons to heart.
[Illustration: FIG. 26.--Bee-Smoker.
(Redrawn from the _A B C of Bee-Culture_, published by the A.I. Root Co,
Medina, Ohio, U.S.A.)
Chosing a location.
Bee-keeping for profit.
Having made himself proficient in practical bee-work and chosen a
suitable location for his apiary, the bee-keeper should carefully select
the particular type of hive most suited to his means and requirements.
This point settled, uniformity is secured, and all loose parts of the
hives being interchangeable time will be saved during the busy season
when time means money. Beginning with not too many stocks he can test
the capabilities of his location before investing much capital in the
undertaking, so that by utilizing the information already given and
adopting the wise adage "make haste slowly" he will realize in good time
whether it will pay best to work for honey in comb or extracted honey in
bulk; not only so, but the knowledge gained will enable him to select
such appliances as are suited to his needs. As a rule, it may be said
that the man content to start with an apiary of moderate size--say fifty
stocks--may realize a fair profit from comb-honey only; but so limited a
venture would need to be supplemented by some other means before an
adequate income could be secured. On the other hand, the owner of one or
two hundred colonies would find it more lucrative to work for extracted
honey and send it out to wholesale buyers in that form. By so doing a
far greater weight of surplus per hive may be secured, and extracted
honey will keep in good condition for years, while comb-honey must be
sold before granulation sets in. At the same time it is but fair to say
that bee-culture in the United Kingdom, if limited to honey-production
alone, is not sufficiently safe for entire reliance to be placed on it
for obtaining a livelihood. The uncertain climate renders it necessary
to include either other branches of the craft less dependent on warmth
and sunshine, or to combine it with fruit-growing, poultry-rearing, &c.
Under such conditions the bees will usually occupy a good position in
the balance-sheet.
Need of forethought.
Another indispensable feature of good bee-management is "forethought,"
coupled with order and neatness; the rule of "a place for everything
and everything in its place" prepares the bee-keeper for any emergency;
constant watchfulness is also necessary, not only to guard against
disease in his hives, but to overlook nothing that tends to be of
advantage to the bees at all seasons. Among the many ways of saving time
nothing is more useful than a carefully-kept note-book, wherein are
recorded brief memoranda regarding such items as condition of each stock
when packed for winter, amount of stores, age and prolific capacity of
queen, strength of colony, healthiness or otherwise, &c., all of which
particulars should be noted and the hives to which they refer plainly
numbered. It also enables the bee-keeper to arrange his day's work
indoors while avoiding disturbance to such colonies as do not need
interference. In the early spring stores must be seen to and replenished
where required; breeding stimulated when pollen begins to be gathered,
and appliances cleaned and prepared for use during the busy season.
Length of bee season.
Swarm prevention.
The main honey-gathering time (lasting about six or seven weeks) is so
brief that in no pursuit is it more important to "make hay while the sun
shines," and if the bee-keeper needs a reminder of this truism he surely
has it in the example set by his bees. As the season advances and the
flowers yield nectar more freely, visible signs of comb-building will be
observed in the whitened edges of empty cells in the brood-chambers; the
thoughtful workers are lengthening out the cells for honey-storing, and
the bee-master takes the hint by giving room in advance, thus lessening
the chance of undesired swarms. In other words, order and method,
combined with the habit of taking time by the forelock, are absolutely
necessary to the bee-keeper, seeing that the enormous army of workers
under his control is multiplying daily by scores of thousands. As spring
merges into summer, sunny days become more frequent; the ever-increasing
breadth of bee-forage yields still more abundantly, and the excitement
among the labourers crowding the hives increases, rendering room in
advance, shade and ventilation, a _sine qua non_. It requires a level
head to keep cool amongst a couple of hundred strong stocks of bees on a
hot summer's day in a good honey season. Moreover, it will be too late
to think of giving ventilation at noontide, when the temperature has
risen to 80 deg. F. in the shade; the necessary precautions for swarm
prevention must therefore be taken in advance, for when what is known as
the "swarming fever" once starts it is most difficult to overcome.
The well-read and intelligent bee-keeper, content to work on orthodox
lines, will be able to manage an apiary--large or small--by guiding and
controlling the countless army he commands in a way that will yield him
both pleasure and profit. All he needs is good bee weather and an apiary
free from disease to make him appreciate bee-craft as one of the most
remunerative of rural industries; affording a wholesome open-air life
conducive to good health and yielding an abundance of contentment.
_Diseases of Bees._--It is quite natural that bees living in colonies
should be subject to diseases, and only since the introduction of
movable-comb hives has it been possible to learn something about these
ailments. The most serious disease with which the bee-keeper has to
contend is that commonly known as "bee-pest" or "foul brood," so called
because of the young brood dying and rotting in the cells. This disease
has been known from the earliest ages, and is probably the same as that
designated by Pliny as _blapsigonia (Natural History_, bk. xi. ch. xx.).
Coming to later times, Della Rocca minutely describes a disease to which
bees were subject in the island of Syra, between the years 1777 and
1780, and through which nearly every colony in the island perished. From
the description given it was undoubtedly foul brood, and the bee-keepers
of the island became convinced, after bitter experience, that it was
extremely contagious. Schirach also mentioned and described the disease
in 1769, and was the first to give it the name of "foul brood." Still
later, in 1874, Dr Cohn, after the most exhaustive experiments and
bacteriological research, realized that the disease was caused by a
bacillus, and--nine years later--the name _Bacillus alvei_ was given to
it by Cheyne and Cheshire, whose views were in agreement with those of
Dr Cohn.
The illustration (fig. 27) shows a portion of comb affected with foul
brood in its worst form. The sealed cells are dark-coloured and sunken,
pierced with irregular holes, and the larvae in all stages from the
crescent-shaped healthy condition to that in which the dead larvae are
seen lying at the bottom of the cells, flaccid and shapeless. The
remains then change to buff colour, afterwards turning brown, when
decomposition sets in, and as the bacilli present in the dead larvae
increase and the nutrient matter is consumed, the mass in some cases
becomes sticky and ropy in character, making its removal impossible by
the bees. In course of time it dries up, leaving nothing but a brown
scale adhering to the bottom or side of the cell. In the worst cases the
larvae even die after the cells are sealed over; a strong characteristic
and offensive odour being developed in some phases of the disease,
noticeable at times some distance away from the hive.
[Illustration: FIG. 27.--Foul Brood (_Bacillus alvei_).
(From Cheshire's _Bees and Bee-keeping, Scientific and Practical._)]
Two forms of foul brood have been long known, one foul smelling, the
other odourless; and investigations made during 1906 and 1907 showed that
the etiology of the disease is not by any means simple, but that it is
produced by different microbes, two others in addition to _Bacillus
alvei_ playing an important part. These are _Bacillus brandenburgiensis_,
Maassen (syn. _B. burri_, Burri: _B. larvae_, white), and _Streptococcus
apis_, Maassen (syn. _B. Guntheri_, Burri). The first two are found in
both forms of foul brood, whereas the last is only present with _B.
alvei_ in the strong-smelling form of the disease, in which the larvae
are attacked prior to the cells being sealed over.
The brood of bees, when healthy, lies in the combs in compact masses,
the larvae being plump and of a pearly whiteness, and when quite young
curled up on their sides at the base of the cells. When attacked by the
disease, the larva moves uneasily, stretches itself out lengthwise in
the cell, and finally becomes loose and flabby, an appearance which
plainly indicates death.
When the disease attacks the larvae before they are sealed over
_Bacillus alvei_ is present, usually associated with _Streptococcus
apis_, which latter imparts a sour smell to the dead brood. In cases
where the disease is odourless the larvae are attacked after the cells
are sealed over, and just before they change to pupae, when they become
slimy, sputum-like masses, difficult to remove from the cells. Under
these conditions _Bacillus brandenburgiensis_ is found, although
_Bacillus alvei_ may also be present. The two bacilli are antagonistic,
each striving for supremacy, first one then the other predominating.
Various other microbes are also present in large numbers, but are not
believed to be pathogenic or disease-producing in character.
It is, therefore, seen that at least three different microbes play an
important part in the same disease. The danger of contagion lies in the
wonderful vitality of the spores, and their great resistance to heat and
cold. Dr Maassen records a case where he had no difficulty in obtaining
cultures from spores removed from combs after being kept dry for twenty
years. It should be borne in mind that the disease is much easier to
cure in the earlier stages while the bacilli are still rod-shaped than
when the rods have turned to spores.
Since the bacterial origin of foul brood has been established, the
efforts of some bacteriologists have been employed in finding a simple
remedy by means of which the disease may be checked in its earliest
stages, and in this an appreciable amount of success has been attained.
Nor has foul brood in its more advanced forms been neglected, all
directions for treatment being found in text-books written by
distinguished writers on apiculture in the United Kingdom, America and
throughout the European continent.
The only other disease to which reference need be made here is
dysentery, which sometimes breaks out after the long confinement bees
are compelled to undergo during severe winters. This trouble may be
guarded against by feeding the bees in the early autumn with good food
made from cane sugar, and housing them in well-ventilated hives kept
warm and dry by suitable coverings. When bees are wintered on thin,
watery food not sealed over, and are unable for months to take cleansing
flights, they become weak and involuntarily discharge their excrement
over the combs and hive, a state of things never seen in a healthy
colony under normal conditions. The stocks of bee-keepers who attend to
the instructions given in text-books are rarely visited by this disease.
The above embraces all that is necessary to be said in relation to
diseases, though bees have been subject to other ailments such as
paralysis, constipation, &c.
In the Isle of Wight a serious epidemic broke out in 1906 which caused
great destruction to bee-life in the following year. The malady was of
an obscure character, but its cause has been under investigation by the
British Board of Agriculture and Fisheries, and by European
bacteriologists in 1908.
AUTHORITIES.--Though in modern times a great deal has appeared in the
daily newspapers on the subject, it is a notable fact that not a tithe
of the wonderful things published in such articles about bees and
bee-keeping is worthy of credence or possesses any real value. Indeed,
a pressman possessing any technical knowledge of the subject--beyond
that obtainable from books--would be a _rara avis_. The account given
above is the result of forty years' practical experience with bees in
England, the writer having for a great portion of the time been
connected editorially with the only two papers in that country
entirely devoted to bees and bee-keeping, _The British Bee Journal_
(weekly, founded 1873), and _Bee-keepers' Record_ (monthly, founded
1882), the former being the only weekly journal in the world. The
following books on the subject may be consulted for further
details:--Francois Huber, _New Observations on the Natural History of
Bees_; T.W. Cowan, _British Bee-keepers' Guide-Book, The Honey Bee,
its Natural History, Anatomy and Physiology; Langstroth on the Honey
Bee_, revised by C. Dadant & Son; A.I. Root, _A B C and X Y Z of
Bee-culture_; F.R. Cheshire, _Bees and Bee-keeping_; Dr Dzierzon,
_Rational Bee-keeping_; E. Bertrand, _Conduite du rucher_; A.J. Cook,
_Manual of the Apiary_; Dr C.C. Miller, _Forty Years among the Bees_;
F.W.L. Sladen, _Queen-rearing in England_; S. Simmins, _A Modern Bee
Farm_. (W. B. Ca.)
BEECH, a well-known tree, _Fagus sylvatica_, a member of the order
Fagaceae to which belong the sweet-chestnut (_Castanea_) and oak. The
name beech is from the Anglo-Saxon _boc, bece_ or _beoce_ (Ger. _Buche_,
Swedish, _bok_), words meaning at once a book and a beech-tree. The
connexion of the beech with the graphic arts is supposed to have
originated in the fact that the ancient Runic tablets were formed of
thin boards of beech-wood. "The origin of the word," says Prior
(_Popular Names of British Plants_), "is identical with that of the
Sanskrit _boko_, letter, _bokos_, writings; and this correspondence of
the Indian and our own is interesting as evidence of two things, viz.
that the Brahmins had the art of writing before they detached themselves
from the common stock of the Indo-European race in Upper Asia, and that
we and other Germans have received alphabetic signs from the East by a
northern route and not by the Mediterranean." Beech-mast, the fruit of
the beech-tree, was formerly known in England as buck; and the county of
Buckingham is so named from its fame as a beech-growing country.
Buckwheat (_Bucheweizen_) derives its name from the similarity of its
angular seeds to beech-mast. The generic name Fagus is derived from
[Greek: phagein] to eat; but the [Greek: phaegos] of Theophrastus was
probably the sweet chestnut (_Aesculus_) of the Romans. Beech-mast has
been used as food in times of distress and famine; and in autumn it
yields an abundant supply of food to park-deer and other game, and to
pigs, which are turned into beech-woods in order to utilize the fallen
mast. In France it is used for feeding pheasants and domestic poultry.
Well-ripened beech-mast yields from 17 to 20% of non-drying oil,
suitable for illumination, and said to be used in some parts of France
and other European countries in cooking, and as a substitute for butter.
The beech is one of the largest British trees, particularly on chalky or
sandy soils, native in England from Yorkshire southwards, and planted in
Scotland and Ireland. It is one of the common forest trees of temperate
Europe, spreading from southern Norway and Sweden to the Mediterranean.
It is found on the Swiss Alps to about 5000 ft. above sea-level, and in
southern Europe is usually confined to high mountain slopes; it is
plentiful in southern Russia, and is widely distributed in Asia Minor
and the northern provinces of Persia.
It is characterized by its sturdy pillar-like stem, often from 15 to 20
ft. in girth, and smooth olive-grey bark. The main branches rise
vertically, while the subsidiary branches spread outwards and give the
whole tree a rounded outline. The slender brown pointed buds give place
in April to clear green leaves fringed with delicate silky hairs. The
flowers which appear in May are inconspicuous and, as usual with our
forest trees, of two kinds; the male, in long-stalked globular clusters,
hang from the axils of the lower leaves of a shoot, while the female,
each of two or three flowers in a tiny cup (cupule of bracts), stand
erect nearer the top of the shoot. In the ripe fruit or mast the
four-sided cupule, which has become much enlarged, brown and tough,
encloses two or three three-sided rich chestnut-brown fruits, each
containing a single seed. It is readily propagated by its seeds. It is a
handsome tree in every stage of its growth, but is more injurious to
plants under its drip than other trees, so that shade-bearing trees, as
holly, yew and thuja, suffer. Its leaves, however, enrich the soil. The
beech has a remarkable power of holding the ground where the soil is
congenial, and the deep shade prevents the growth of other trees. It is
often and most usefully mixed with oak and Scotch fir. The timber is not
remarkable for either strength or durability. It was formerly much used
in mill-work and turnery; but its principal use at present is in the
manufacture of chairs, bedsteads and a variety of minor articles. It
makes excellent fuel and charcoal. The copper-beech is a variety with
copper-coloured leaves, due to the presence of a red colouring-matter in
the sap. There is also a weeping or pendulous-branched variety; and
several varieties with more or less cut leaves, are known in
cultivation.
The genus _Fagus_ is widely spread in temperate regions, and contains in
addition to our native beech, about 15 other species. A variety (_F.
sylvatica_ var. _Sieboldi_) is a native of Japan, where it is one of the
finest and most abundant of the deciduous-leaved forest trees. _Fagus
americana_ is one of the most beautiful and widely-distributed trees of
the forests of eastern North America. It was confounded by early
European travellers with _F. sylvatica_, from which it is distinguished
by its paler bark and lighter green, more sharply-toothed leaves.
Several species are found in Australia and New Zealand, and in the
forests of southern Chile and Patagonia. The dense forests which cover
the shore of the Straits of Magellan and the mountain-slopes of Tierra
del Fuego consist largely of two beeches--one evergreen, _Fagus
betuloides_, and one with deciduous leaves, _F. antarctica_.
BEECHER, CHARLES EMERSON (1856-1904), American palaeontologist, was born
at Dunkirk, New York, on the 9th of October 1856. He graduated at the
university of Michigan in 1878, and then became assistant to James Hall
in the state museum at Albany. Ten years later he was appointed to the
charge of the invertebrate fossils in the Peabody Museum, New Haven,
under O.C. Marsh, whom he succeeded in 1899 as curator. Meanwhile in
1889 he received the degree of Ph.D. from Yale University for his memoir
on the _Brachiospongidae_, a remarkable group of Silurian sponges;
later on he did good work among the fossil corals, and other groups,
being ultimately regarded as a leading authority on fossil crustacea and
brachiopoda; his researches on the development of the brachiopoda, and
on the Trilobites _Triarthrus_ and _Trinudeus_, were especially
noteworthy. In 1892 he was appointed professor of palaeontology in Yale
University. He died on the 14th of February 1904.
Memoir by C. Schuchert in _Amer. Journ. Science_, vol. xvii., June
1904 (with portrait and bibliography).
BEECHER, HENRY WARD (1813-1887), American preacher and reformer, was
born in Litchfield, Connecticut, on the 24th of June 1813. He was the
eighth child of Lyman and Roxana Foote Beecher, and brother of Harriet
Beecher Stowe. Entering Amherst College in 1830, and graduating four
years later, he gave more attention to his own courses of reading than
to college studies, and was more popular with his fellows than with the
faculty. With a patience foreign to his impulsive nature, he submitted
to minute drill in elocution, and became a fluent extemporaneous
speaker. Reared in a Puritan atmosphere, he has graphically described
the mystical experience which, coming to him in his early youth, changed
his whole conception of theology and determined his choice of the
ministry. "I think," he says, "that when I stand in Zion and before God,
the highest thing that I shall look back upon will be that blessed
morning of May when it pleased God to reveal to my wondering soul the
idea that it was His nature to love a man in his sins for the sake of
helping him out of them." In 1837 he graduated from Lane Theological
Seminary in Ohio, of which his father was president, and entered upon
his work as pastor of a missionary Presbyterian church at Lawrenceburg,
Indiana, a village on the Ohio, about 20 m. below Cincinnati. The
membership numbered nineteen women and one man. Beecher was sexton as
well as preacher. Two years later he accepted a call to Indianapolis.
His unconventional preaching shocked the more staid members of the
flock, but filled the church to overflowing with people unaccustomed to
churchgoing. He studied men rather than books; became acquainted with
the vices in what was then a pioneer town; and in his _Seven Lectures to
Young Men_ (1844) treated these with genuine power of realistic
description and with youthful and exuberant rhetoric. Eight years later
(1847) he accepted a call to the pastorate of Plymouth Church
(Congregational), then newly organized in Brooklyn, New York. The
situation of the church, within five minutes' walk of the chief ferry to
New York, the stalwart character of the man who had organized it, and
the peculiar eloquence of Beecher, combined to make the pulpit a
national platform. The audience-room of the church, capable of seating
2000 or 2500 people, frequently contained 500 or 1000 more.
Beecher at once became a recognized leader. On the all-absorbing
question of slavery he took a middle ground between the pro-slavery or
peace party, and abolitionists like William Lloyd Garrison and Wendell
Phillips, believing, with such statesmen as W.H. Seward, Salmon P.
Chase, and Abraham Lincoln, that slavery was to be overthrown under the
constitution and in the Union, by forbidding its growth and trusting to
an awakened conscience, enforced by an enlightened self-interest. He was
always an anti-slavery man, but never technically an abolitionist, and
he joined the Republican party soon after its organization. In the
earlier days of the agitation, he challenged the hostility which often
mobbed the anti-slavery gatherings; in the later days he consulted with
the political leaders, inspiring the patriotism of the North, and
sedulously setting himself to create a public opinion which should
confirm and ratify the emancipation proclamation whenever the president
should issue it. When danger of foreign intervention cast its
threatening shadow across the national path, he went to England, and by
his famous addresses did what probably no other American could have done
to strengthen the spirit in England favourable to the United States, and
to convert that which was doubtful and hostile. In 1861-1863 he was the
editor-in-chief of the _Independent_, then a Congregational journal; and
in his editorials, copied far and wide, produced a profound impression
on the public mind by clarifying and defining the issue. Later (in
1870), he founded and became editor-in-chief of the _Christian Union_,
afterwards the _Outlook_, a religious undenominational weekly. His
lectures and addresses had the spirit if not the form of his sermons,
just as his sermons were singularly free from the homiletical tone. Yet
his work as a reformer was subsidiary to his work as a preacher. He was
not indeed a parish pastor; he inspired church activities which grew to
large proportions, but trusted the organization of them to laymen of
organizing abilities in the church; and for acquaintance with his people
he depended on such social occasions as were furnished in the free
atmosphere of this essentially New England church at the close of every
service. But during his pastorate the church grew to be probably the
largest in membership in the United States.
It was in the pulpit that Beecher was seen at his best. His mastery of
the English tongue, his dramatic power, his instinctive art of
impersonation, which had become a second nature, his vivid imagination,
his breadth of intellectual view, the catholicity of his sympathies, his
passionate enthusiasm, which made for the moment his immediate theme
seem to him the one theme of transcendent importance, his quaint humour
alternating with genuine pathos, and above all his simple and singularly
unaffected devotional nature, made him as a preacher without a peer in
his own time and country. His favourite theme was love: love to man was
to him the fulfilment of all law; love of God was the essence of all
Christianity. Retaining to the day of his death the forms and phrases of
the New England theology in which he had been reared, he poured into
them a new meaning and gave to them a new significance. He probably did
more than any other man in America to lead the Puritan churches from a
faith which regarded God as a moral governor, the Bible as a book of
laws, and religion as obedience to a conscience to a faith which regards
God as a father, the Bible as a book of counsels, and religion as a life
of liberty in love. The later years of his life were darkened by a
scandal which Beecher's personal, political and theological enemies used
for a time effectively to shadow a reputation previously above reproach,
he being charged by Theodore Tilton, whom he had befriended, with having
had improper relations with his (Tilton's) wife. But in the midst of
these accusations (February 1876), the largest and most representative
Congregational council ever held in the United States gave expression to
a vote of confidence in him, which time has absolutely justified. Not a
student of books nor a technical scholar in any department, Beecher's
knowledge was as wide as his interests were varied. He was early
familiar with the works of Matthew Arnold, Charles Darwin and Herbert
Spencer; he preached his _Bible Studies_ sermons in 1878, when the
higher criticism was wholly unknown to most evangelical ministers or
known only to be dreaded; and his sermons on _Evolution and Religion_ in
1885, when many of the ministry were denouncing evolution as atheistic.
He was stricken with apoplexy while still active in the ministry, and
died at Brooklyn on the 8th of March 1887, in the seventy-fourth year of
his age.
The principal books by Beecher, besides his published sermons, are:
_Seven Lectures to Young Men_ (1844); _Plymouth Collection of Hymns
and Tunes_ (1855); _Star Papers, Experiences of Art and Nature_
(1855); _Life Thoughts_ (1858); _New Star Papers; or Views and
Experiences of Religious Subjects_ (1859); _Plain and Pleasant Talks
about Fruits, Flowers, and Farming_ (1859); _American Rebellion,
Report of Speeches delivered in England at Public Meetings in
Manchester, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Liverpool, and London_ (1864);
_Prayers from Plymouth Pulpit_ (1867); _Norwood: A Tale of Village
Life in New England_ (1867); _The Life of Jesus the Christ_ (1871),
completed in 2 vols. by his sons (1891); and _Yale Lectures on
Preaching_ (3 vols., 1872-1874).
The prinipal lives are: Noyes L. Thompson, _The History of Plymouth
Church_ (1847-1872); Thomas W. Knox, _The Life and Work of Henry Ward
Beecher_ (Hartford, Conn., 1887); Frank S. Child, _The Boyhood of
Henry Ward Beecher_ (Pamphlet, New Creston, Conn., 1887); Joseph
Howard, Jr., _Life of Henry Ward Beecher_ (Philadelphia, 1887); T.W.
Hanford, _Beecher: Christian Philosopher, Pulpit Orator, Patriot and
Philanthropist_ (Chicago, 1887); Lyman Abbott and S.B. Halliday,
_Henry Ward Beecher: A Sketch of his Career_ (New York, 1887); William
C. Beecher, Rev. Samuel Scoville and Mrs. H.W. Beecher, _A Biography
of Henry Ward Beecher_ (New York, 1888); John R. Howard, _Henry Ward
Beecher: A Study_ (1891); John Henry Barrows, _Henry Ward Beecher_
(New York, 1893); and Lyman Abbott, _Henry Ward Beecher_ (Boston,
1903). (L. A.)
BEECHER, LYMAN (1775-1863), American clergyman, was born at New Haven,
Connecticut, on the 12th of October 1775. He was a descendant of one of
the founders of the New Haven colony, worked as a boy in an uncle's
blacksmith shop and on his farm, and in 1797 graduated from Yale, having
studied theology under Timothy Dwight. He preached in the Presbyterian
church at East Hampton, Long Island (1798-1810, being ordained in 1799);
in the Congregational church at Litchfield, Connecticut (1810-1826), in
the Hanover Street church of Boston (1826-1832), and in the Second
Presbyterian church of Cincinnati, Ohio (1833-1843); was president of
the newly established Lane Theological Seminary at Walnut Hills,
Cincinnati, and was professor of didactic and polemic theology there
(1832-1850), being professor emeritus until his death. At Litchfield and
in Boston he was a prominent opponent of the growing "heresy" of
Unitarianism, though as early as 1836 he was accused of being a
"moderate Calvinist" and was tried for heresy, but was acquitted. Upon
his resignation from Lane Theological Seminary he lived in Boston for a
short time, devoting himself to literature; but he broke down, and the
last ten years of his life were spent at the home of his son, Henry Ward
Beecher, in Brooklyn, New York, where he died on the both of January
1863. Magnetic in personality, incisive and powerful in manner of
expression, he was in his prime one of the most eloquent of American
pulpit orators. In 1806 he preached a widely circulated sermon on
duelling, and about 1814 a series of six sermons on intemperance, which
were reprinted frequently and greatly aided temperance reform. Thrice
married, he had a large family, his seven sons becoming Congregational
clergymen, and his daughters, Harriet Beecher Stowe (q.v.) and Catherine
Esther Beecher, attaining literary distinction.
Lyman Beecher's published works include: _A Plea for the West_ (1835),
_Views in Theology_ (1836), and various sermons; his _Collected Works_
were published at Boston in 1852 in 3 vols. Consult his _Autobiography
and Correspondence_ (2 vols., New York, 1863-1864), edited by his son
Charles; D.H. Alien, _Life and Services of Lyman Beecher_ (Cincinnati,
1863); and James C. White, _Personal Reminiscences of Lyman Beecher_
(New York, 1882).
His daughter, CATHERINE ESTHER (1800-1878), was born at East Hampton,
Long Island, on the 6th of September 1800. She was educated at
Litchfield Seminary, and from 1822 to 1832 conducted a school for girls
at Hartford, Connecticut, with her sister Harriet's assistance, and from
1832 to 1834 conducted a similar school in Cincinnati. She wrote and
lectured on women's education and in behalf of better primary schools,
and radically opposed woman suffrage and college education for women,
holding woman's sphere to be domestic. The National Board of Popular
Education, a charitable society which she founded, sent hundreds of
women as teachers into the South and West. She died on the 12th of May
1878 in Elmira, New York. She published _An Essay on Slavery and
Abolition with Reference to the Duty of American Females_ (1837), _A
Treatise on Domestic Economy_ (1842), _The True Remedy for the Wrongs of
Women_ (1851), _Letters to the People on Health and Happiness_ (1855),
_The Religious Training of Children_ (1864), and _Woman's Profession as
Mother and Educator_ (1871).
His son, EDWARD BEECHER (1803-1895), was born at East Hampton, Long
Island, on the 27th of August 1803, graduated at Yale in 1822, studied
theology at Andover, and in 1826 became pastor of the Park Street church
in Boston. From 1830 to 1844 he was president of Illinois College,
Jacksonville, Illinois, and subsequently filled pastorates at the Salem
Street church, Boston (1844-1855), and the Congregational church at
Galesburg, Illinois (1855-1871). He was senior editor of the
_Congregationalist_ (1849-1855), and an associate editor of the
_Christian Union_ from 1870. In 1872 he settled in Brooklyn, New York,
where in 1885-1889 he was pastor of the Parkville church and where he
died on the 28th of July 1895. He wrote _Addresses on the Kingdom of
God_ (1827), _History of the Alton Riots_ (1837), _Statement of
Anti-Slavery Principles_ (1837), _Baptism, its Import and Modes_ (1850),
_The Conflict of Ages_ (1853), _The Papal Conspiracy Exposed_ (1855),
_The Concord of Ages_ (1860), and _History of Opinions on the Scriptural
Doctrine of Future Retribution_ (1878).
CHARLES BEECHER (1815-1900), another of Lyman's sons, was born at
Litchfield, Connecticut, on the 7th of October 1815. He graduated at
Bowdoin College in 1834, and subsequently held pastorates at Newark, New
Jersey (1851-1857), and Georgetown, Massachusetts; and from 1870 to 1877
lived in Florida, where he was state superintendent of public
instruction in 1871-1873. He died at Georgetown, Massachusetts, on the
21st of April 1900. He was an accomplished musician, and assisted in the
selection and arrangement of music in the _Plymouth Collection of Hymns
and Tunes_. He wrote _David and His Throne_ (1855), _Pen Pictures of the
Bible_ (1855), _Redeemer and Redeemed_ (1864), and _Spiritual
Manifestations_ (1879).
THOMAS KINNICUTT BEECHER (1824-1900), another son, born at Litchfield,
Connecticut, on the 10th of February 1824, was pastor of the Independent
Congregational church (now the Park church), at Elmira, New York, one of
the first institutional churches in the country, from 1854 until his
death at Elmira on the 14th of March 1900. He wrote Our _Seven Churches_
(1870).
BEECHEY, FREDERICK WILLIAM (1796-1856), English naval officer and
geographer, son of Sir William Beechey, R.A., was born in London on the
17th of February 1796. In 1806 he entered the navy, and saw active
service during the wars with France and America. In 1818 he served under
Lieutenant (afterwards Sir) John Franklin in Buchan's Arctic expedition,
of which at a later period he published a narrative; and in the
following year he accompanied Lieutenant W.E. Parry in the "Hecla." In
1821 he took part in the survey of the Mediterranean coast of Africa
under the direction of Captain, afterwards Admiral, William Henry Smyth.
He and his brother Henry William Beechey, made an overland survey of
this coast, and published a full account of their work in 1828 under the
title of _Proceedings of the Expedition to Explore the Northern Coast of
Africa from Tripoly Eastward in 1821-1822_. In 1825 Beechey was
appointed to command the "Blossom," which was intended to explore Bering
Strait, in concert with Franklin and Parry operating from the east. He
passed the strait and penetrated as far as 71 deg. 23' 31" N., and 156
deg. 21' 30" W., reaching a point only 146 m. west of that reached by
Franklin's expedition from the Mackenzie river. The whole voyage lasted
more than three years; and in the course of it Beechey discovered
several islands in the Pacific, and an excellent harbour near Cape
Prince of Wales. In 1831 there appeared his _Narrative of a Voyage to
the Pacific and Bering's Strait to Co-operate with the Polar
Expeditions, 1825-1828_. In 1835 and the following year Captain Beechey
was employed on the coast survey of South America, and from 1837 to 1847
carried on the same work along the Irish coasts. He was appointed in
1850 to preside over the Marine Department of the Board of Trade. In
1854 he was made rear-admiral, and in the following year was elected
president of the Royal Geographical Society. He died on the 29th of
November 1856.
BEECHEY, SIR WILLIAM (1753-1839), English portrait-painter, was born at
Burford. He was originally meant for a conveyancer, but a strong love
for painting induced him to become a pupil at the Royal Academy in 1772.
Some of his smaller portraits gained him considerable reputation; he
began to be employed by the nobility, and in 1793 became associate of
the Academy. In the same year he was made portrait-painter to Queen
Charlotte. He painted the portraits of the members of the royal family,
and of nearly all the most famous or fashionable persons of the time.
What is considered his finest production is a review of cavalry, a large
composition, in the foreground of which he introduced portraits of
George III., the prince of Wales and the duke of York, surrounded by a
brilliant staff on horseback. It was painted in 1798, and obtained for
the artist the honour of knighthood, and his election as R.A.
BEECHING, HENRY CHARLES (1859- ), English clergyman and author, was
born on the 15th of May 1859, and educated at the City of London school
and at Balliol College, Oxford. He took holy orders in 1882, and after
three years in a Liverpool curacy he was for fifteen years rector of
Yattendon, Berkshire. From 1900 to 1903 he lectured on pastoral and
liturgical theology at King's College, London, and was chaplain of
Lincoln's Inn, where he became preacher in 1903. He became a canon of
Westminster in 1902, and examining chaplain to the bishop of Carlisle in
1905. As a poet he is best known by his share in two volumes--_Love in
Idleness_ (1883) and _Love's Looking Glass_ (1891)--which contained also
poems by J.W. Mackail and J. Bowyer Nichols. He was a sympathetic editor
and critic of the works of many 16th and 17th century poets, of Richard
Crashaw (1905), of Herrick (1907), of John Milton (1900), of Henry
Vaughan (1896). Under the pseudonym of "Urbanus Sylvan" he published two
successful volumes of essays, _Pages from a Private Diary_ (1898) and
_Provincial Letters and other Papers_ (1906). His works also include
numerous volumes of sermons and essays on theological subjects.
BEECHWORTH, a town of Bogong county, Victoria, Australia, 172 m. by rail
N.E. of Melbourne. Pop. (1901) 7359. The town is the centre of the Ovens
goldfields, and the district is mainly devoted to mining with both
alluvial and reef working, but much of the land is under cultivation,
yielding grain and fruit. The water supply is derived from Lake Kerferd
in the vicinity, which is a favourite resort of visitors; the scenery
near the town, which lies at an elevation of 1805 ft. among the May Day
Hills, being singularly beautiful. The industries of Beechworth include
tanning, ironfounding and coach-building.
BEEF (through O. Fr. _boef_, mod. _boeuf_, from Lat. _bos, bovis_, ox,
Gr. [Greek: bous], which show the ultimate connexion with the Sanskrit
_go, gaus_, ox, and thus with "cow"), the flesh of the ox, cow or bull,
as used for food. The use of the French word for the meat, while the
Saxon name was retained for the animal, has been often noticed, and
paralleled with the use of veal, mutton and pork. "Beef" is also used,
especially in the plural "beeves," for the ox itself, but usually in an
archaic way. "Corned" or "corn" beef is the flesh cured by salting, i.e.
sprinkling with "corns" or granulated particles of salt. "Collared" beef
is so called from the roll or collar into which the meat is pressed,
after extracting the bones. "Jerked" beef, i.e. meat cut into long thin
slices and dried in the sun, like "biltong" (q.v.), comes through the
Spanish-American _charque_, from _echarqui_, the Peruvian word for this
species of preserved meat. For "Beefeater" see YEOMEN OF THE GUARD.
BEEFSTEAK CLUB, the name of several clubs formed in London during the
18th and 19th centuries. The first seems to have been that founded in
1709 with Richard Estcourt, the actor, as steward. Of this the chief
wits and great men of the nation were members and its badge was a
gridiron. Its fame was, however, entirely eclipsed in 1735 when "The
Sublime Society of Steaks" was established by John Rich at Covent Garden
theatre, of which he was then manager. It is said that Lord Peterborough
supping one night with Rich in his private room, was so delighted with
the steak the latter grilled him that he suggested a repetition of the
meal the next week. From this started the Club, the members of which
delighted to call themselves "The Steaks." Among them were Hogarth,
Garrick, Wilkes, Bubb Doddington and many other celebrities. The
rendezvous was the theatre till the fire in 1808, when the club moved
first to the Bedford Coffee House, and the next year to the Old Lyceum.
In 1785 the prince of Wales joined, and later his brothers the dukes of
Clarence and Sussex became members. On the burning of the Lyceum, "The
Steaks" met again in the Bedford Coffee House till 1838, when the New
Lyceum was opened, and a large room there was allotted the club. These
meetings were held till the club ceased to exist in 1867. Thomas
Sheridan founded a Beefsteak Club in Dublin at the Theatre Royal in
1749, and of this Peg Woffington was president. The modern Beefsteak
Club was founded by J.L. Toole, the actor, in 1876.
See J. Timbs, _Clubs and Club Life in London_ (1873); Walter Arnold,
_Life and Death of the Sublime Society of Steaks_ (1871).
BEELZEBUB, BEELZEBUL, BAALZEBUB. In 2 Kings i. we read that Ahaziah ben
Ahab, king of Israel, fell sick, and sent to inquire of Baalzebub, the
god of the Philistine city Ekron, whether he should recover. There is no
other mention of this god in the Old Testament. _Baal_, "lord," is the
ordinary title or word for a deity, especially a local deity, cf. such
place names as Baal Hazor (2 Sam. xiii. 23), Baal Hermon (Judges iii.
3), which are probably contractions of fuller forms, like Beth Baal Meon
(Josh. xiii. 17), the House or Temple of the Baal of Meon. According to
these analogies we should expect _Zebub_ to be a place. No place
_Zebub_, however, is known; and it has been objected that the Baal of
some other place would hardly be the god of Ekron. These objections are
hardly conclusive.
Usually _Zebub_ is identified with a Hebrew common noun _zebub_ =
flies,[1] occurring twice in the Old Testament,[2] so that Baalzebub "is
the Baal to whom flies belong or are holy. As children of the summer
they are symbols of the warmth of the sun, to which ... Baal stands in
close relation. Divination by means of flies was known at Babylon."[3]
There are other cases of names compounded of Baal and an element
equivalent to a descriptive epithet, e.g. Baalgad, the Baal of
Fortune.[4] For the "Fly-god," sometimes interpreted as the "averter of
insects," cf [Greek: Zeus apomouios, muiagros], and the Hercules [Greek:
muiagros]. Clemens Alexander speaks of a Hercules [Greek: apomuios] as
worshipped at Rome. It has been suggested that Baalzebub was the
dung-beetle, _Scarabaeus pillularius_, worshipped in Egypt.
A name of a deity on an Assyrian inscription of the 12th century B.C.
has been read as _Baal-zabubi_, but this reading has now been abandoned
in favour of _Baal-sapunu_ (Baal-Zephon).[5] Cheyne considers that
Baalzebub is a "contemptuous uneuphonic Jewish modification of the true
name Baalzebul."[6]
In the New Testament we meet with Beelzebul,[7] which some of the
versions, especially the Vulgate and Syriac, followed by the Authorized
Version, have changed to Beelzebub, under the influence of 2 Kings. In
Matt. x. 25, Christ speaks of men calling the master of the house, i.e.
Himself, Beelzebul.[8] In Mark iii 22-27,[9] the scribes explain that
Jesus is possessed by Beelzebul[10] and is thus enabled to cast out
devils. The passage speaks of Beelzebul as Satan and as the prince of
the demons.
The origin of the name Beelzebul is variously explained. (a) It is "a
phonetic corruption, perhaps a softening of the original word"; as
Bab-el-mandel is a corruption of Bab-el-mandeb. (b) _Zebul_ is from
_zebel_, a word found in the Targums in the sense of "dung," so that
Beelzebul would mean "Lord of Dung," a term of contempt. The further
suggestion has been made that _zebul_ itself in the sense of "dung" is a
term for a heathen deity, cf. the Old Testament use of "abomination" &c.
for heathen deities, so that Beelzebul would mean "Chief of false gods,"
and so arch-fiend. (c) _Zebul_ is found in 1 Kings viii. 13 in the sense
of "height," _beth-sebul_--lofty house, and in Rabbinical writings in
the sense of "house" or "temple," or "the fourth heaven";[11] and
Beelzebul may equal "Lord of the High House" or "Lord of Heaven." This
view is perhaps favoured by Matt. x. 25, "if they have called the lord
of the house Beelzebul." It appears, however, that Rabbinical writings
use _yom_ (day-of) _zebul_ for the festival of a heathen deity; and
Jastrow connects this usage with the meaning "house" or "temple," so
that the meaning "Lord of the False Gods" might be arrived at in a
different way.
The names _Zebulun, 'Izebel_ (Jezebel), suggest that _Zebul_ may be an
ancient name of a deity; cf. the names [Hebrew: baal ezebel] (B'L 'ZBL),
[Hebrew: shemzebel] (ShMZBL) in Punic and Phoenician inscriptions.[12]
The substitution of Beelzebub for Beelzebul by the Syriac, Vulgate and
other versions implies the identification of the New Testament
arch-fiend with the god of Ekron; this substitution, however, may be due
to the influence of the Aramaic _B'el-debaba_, "adversary," sometimes
held to be the original of these names.
There is no trace of Beelzebul or Beelzebub outside of the Biblical
passages mentioned, and the literature dependent on them. If we assume a
connexion between the two names, there is nothing to show how the god
became in later times the devil.
In _Paradise Lost_, Book ii., Beelzebub appears as second only to Satan
himself.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Lightfoot, _Horae Hebraicae et Talmudicae_, Works, vol.
ii. pp. 188 f., 429, ed. Strype (1684); Baethgen, _Beitrage zur
semitischen Religionsgeschichte_, pp. 25, 65, 261. Commentaries on the
Biblical passages especially Burney and Skinner on _Kings_, Meyer and
A.B. Bruce on the _Synoptic Gospels_, and Swete on _Mark_. Articles on
"Baal," "Baalzebub," "Beelzebub," "Beelzebul," in Hastings' _Bible
Dict._, Black and Cheyne's _Encycl. Bibl._, and Hauck's
_Realencyklopadie_; on [Hebrew: baal zebub] in Clarendon Press _Hebr.
Lex._; and on [Hebrew: zebel] and [Hebrew: zebul] in Jastrow's _Dict.
of the Targumim, &c._ (W. H. Be.)
FOOTNOTES:
[1] So Clarendon Press, _Hebrew Lexicon_, p. 127, with LXX.
[2] Eccl. x. 1; Isaiah vii. 18.
[3] Baethgen, _Beitrage zur semitischen Religionsgeschichte_, p. 25,
cf. pp. 65, 261.
[4] Josh, xii. 7.
[5] Art. "Baalzebub," Black and Cheyne's _Ency. Bibl._
[6] With various spellings (e.g. Belzebul, and in XB, Beezebul), all
variants of Beelzebul. Cf. Deissmann, _Bible Studies_, 332.
[7] There is a variation of reading, which has been held to support
the view that the passage means that men reproached Jesus with His
supposed connexion with Beelzebul; cf. A.B. Bruce, _in loco_.
[8] And in the parallel passages, Matt. xii. 22-29; Luke xi. 14-22.
[9] Cf. John vii. 20, viii. 48, 52, x. 20.
[10] Swete, _in loco_.
[11] Jastrow, _Dict. of the Targumim._ &c., sub voce.
[12] Lidzbarski, _Handbuch der nordsemitischen Epigraphik_, i. pp.
240, 377.
BEER, a beverage obtained by a process of alcoholic fermentation mainly
from cereals (chiefly malted barley), hops and water. The history of
beer extends over several thousand years. According to Dr Bush, a beer
made from malt or red barley is mentioned in Egyptian writings as early
as the fourth dynasty. It was called [Hieroglyph] or _heqa_. Papyri of
the time of Seti I. (1300 B.C.) allude to a person inebriated from
over-indulgence in beer. In the second book (c. 77) of Herodotus (450
B.C.) we are told that the Egyptians, being without vines, made wine
from barley (cf. Aesch. _Suppl._ 954); but as the grape is mentioned so
frequently in Scripture and elsewhere as being most abundant there, and
no record exists of the vine being destroyed, we must conclude that the
historian was only partially acquainted with the productions of that
most fertile country. Pliny (_Natural History_, xxii. 82) informs us
that the Egyptians made wine from corn, and gives it the name of
_sythum_, which, in the Greek, means drink from barley. The Greeks
obtained their knowledge of the art of preparing beer from the
Egyptians. The writings of Archilochus, the Parian poet and satirist who
flourished about 650 B.C., contain evidence that the Greeks of his day
were acquainted with the process of brewing. There is, in fact, little
doubt that the discovery of beer and its use as an exhilarating beverage
were nearly as early as those of the grape itself, though both the
Greeks and the Romans despised it as a barbarian drink. Dioscorides
mentions two kinds of beer, namely [Greek: zythos] and [Greek: kourmi],
but he does not describe them sufficiently to enable us to distinguish
them. Sophocles and other Greek writers, again, styled it [Greek:
bryton]. In the time of Tacitus (1st century after Christ), according to
him, beer was the usual drink of the Germans, and there can be little
doubt that the method of malting barley was then known to them. Pliny
(_Nat. Hist._ xxii. 82) mentions the use of beer in Spain under the name
of _celia_ and _ceria_ and in Gaul under that of _cerevisia_; and
elsewhere (xiv. 29) he says:--"The natives who inhabit the west of
Europe have a liquid with which they intoxicate themselves, made from
corn and water. The manner of making this liquid is somewhat different
in Gaul, Spain and other countries, and it is called by different names,
but its nature and properties are everywhere the same. The people in
Spain in particular brew this liquid so well that it will keep good a
long time. So exquisite is the cunning of mankind in gratifying their
vicious appetites that they have thus invented a method to make water
itself produce intoxication."
The knowledge of the preparation of a fermented beverage from cereals in
early times was not confined to Europe. Thus, according to Dr H.H. Mann,
the Kaffir races of South Africa have made for ages--and still make--a
kind of beer from millet, and similarly the natives of Nubia, Abyssinia
and other parts of Africa prepare an intoxicating beverage, generally
called _bousa_, from a variety of cereal grains. The Russian _quass_,
made from barley and rye, the Chinese _samshu_, made from rice, and the
Japanese _sake_ (q.v.) are all of ancient origin. Roman historians
mention the fact that the Britons in the south of England at the time of
the Roman invasion brewed a species of ale from barley and wheat. The
Romans much improved the methods of brewing in vogue among the Britons,
and the Saxons--among whom ale had long been a common beverage--in their
turn profited much by the instruction given to the original inhabitants
of Great Britain by the Romans. We are informed by William of Malmesbury
that in the reign of Henry II. the English were greatly addicted to
drinking, and by that time the monasteries were already famous, both in
England and on the continent, for the excellence of their ales. The
waters of Burton-on-Trent began to be famous in the 13th century. The
secret of their being so especially adapted for brewing was first
discovered by some monks, who held land in the adjacent neighbourhood of
Wetmore. There is a document dated 1295 in which it is stated that
Matilda, daughter of Nicholas de Shoben, had re-leased to the abbot and
convent of Burton-on-Trent certain tenements within and without the
town; for which re-lease they granted her, daily for life, two white
loaves from the monastery, two gallons of conventual beer, and one
penny, besides seven gallons of beer for the men. The abbots of Burton
apparently made their own malt, for it was a common covenant in leases
of mills belonging to the abbey that the malt of the lords of the manor,
both spiritual and temporal, should be ground free of charge. Robert
Plot, in his _Natural History of Staffordshire_ (1686), refers to the
peculiar properties of the Burton waters, from which, he says, "by an
art well known in this country good ale is made, in the management of
which they have a knack of fining it in three days to that degree that
it shall not only be potable, but is clear and palatable as we could
desire any drink of this kind to be." In 1630 Burton beer began to be
known in London, being sold at "Ye Peacocke" in Gray's Inn Lane, and
according to the _Spectator_ was in great demand amongst the visitors in
Vauxhall. Until tea and coffee were introduced, beer and ale (see ALE)
were, practically speaking, the only popular beverages accessible to the
general body of consumers. Since the advent of tea, coffee, cocoa and
mineral waters, the character of British beers has undergone a gradual
modification, the strongly alcoholic, heavily hopped liquids consumed by
the previous generation slowly giving place to the lighter beverages in
vogue at the present time. The old "stock bitter" has given way to the
"light dinner ale," and "porter" (so called from the fact that it was
the popular drink amongst the market porters of the 18th century) has
been largely replaced by "mild ale." A certain quantity of strong
beer--such as heavy stouts and "stock" and "Scotch" ales--is still
brewed nowadays, but it is not an increasing one. The demand is almost
entirely for medium beers such as mild ale, light stout, and the better
class of "bitter" beers, and light beers such as the light "family
ales," "dinner ales" and lager.
The general run of beers contain from 3 to 6% of alcohol and 4 to 7% of
solids, the remainder being water and certain flavouring and
preservative matters derived from the malt, hops and other materials
employed in their manufacture. The solid, i.e. non-volatile, matter
contained in solution in beer consists mainly of maltose or malt sugar,
of several varieties of dextrin (see BREWING), of substances which stand
in an intermediate position between the sugars and the dextrins proper,
and of a number of bodies containing nitrogen, such as the
non-coagulable proteids, peptones, &c. In addition there is an
appreciable quantity of mineral matter, chiefly phosphates and potash.
Dietetically regarded, therefore, beer possesses considerable food
value, and, moreover, the nutritious matter in beer is present in a
readily assimilable form.
It is probable that the average adult member of the British working
classes consumes not less than two pints of beer daily. A reasonable
calculation places the total proteids and carbohydrates consumed by the
average worker at 140 and 400 grammes respectively. Taking the proteid
content of the average beer at 0.4% and the carbohydrate content at 4%,
a simple calculation shows that about 3% of the total proteid and 11% of
the total carbohydrate food of the average worker will be consumed in
the shape of beer.
The chemical composition of beers of different types will be gathered
from the following tables.
A. ENGLISH BEERS.
(Analyses by J.L. Baker, Hulton & P. Schidrowitz.)
I. _Mild Ales._
+---------+------------------+-----------+------------------------+
| Number.| Original Gravity.| Alcohol %.| Extractives (Solids) %.|
+---------+------------------+-----------+------------------------+
| 1.[1] | 1055.13 | 4.17 | 6.1 |
| 2.[1] | 1055.64 | 4.47 | 5.7 |
| 3.[2] | 1071.78 | 5.57 | 7.3 |
+---------+------------------+-----------+------------------------+
II. _Light Bitters and Ales._
+---------+------------------+-----------+------------------------+
| Number.| Original Gravity.| Alcohol %.| Extractives (Solids) %.|
+---------+------------------+-----------+------------------------+
| 1. | 1046.81 | 4.15 | 4.0 |
| 2. | 1047.69 | 4.23 | 4.1 |
| 3. | 1047.79 | 4.61 | 3.2 |
| 4. | 1050.30 | 4.53 | 4.2 |
| 5. | 1038.31 | 3.81 | 3.5 |
+---------+------------------+-----------+------------------------+
III. _Pale and Stock Ales._
+---------+------------------+-----------+------------------------+
| Number.| Original Gravity.| Alcohol %.| Extractives (Solids) %.|
+---------+------------------+-----------+------------------------+
| 1.[3] | 1059.01 | 4.77 | 5.8 |
| 2.[4] | 1068.58 | 5.48 | 7.1 |
| 3.[4] | 1076.80 | 6.68 | 5.9 |
+---------+------------------+-----------+------------------------+
IV. _Stouts and Porter._
+---------+------------------+-----------+------------------------+
| Number.| Original Gravity.| Alcohol %.| Extractives (Solids) %.|
+---------+------------------+-----------+------------------------+
| 1.[5] | 1072.92 | 6.14 | 6.3 |
| 2.[6] | 1054.26 | 4.73 | 4.5 |
| 3.[6] | 1081.62 | 6.02 | 8.8 |
| 4.[7] | 1054.11 | 3.90 | 6.5 |
+---------+------------------+-----------+------------------------+
The figures in the above tables are very fairly representative of
different classes of British and Irish beers. It will be noticed that
the _Mild Ales_ are of medium original gravity[8] and alcoholic
strength, but contain a relatively large proportion of solid matter. The
_Light Bitters and Ales_ are of a low original gravity, but compared
with the Mild Ales the proportion of alcohol to solids is higher. The
_Pale and Stock Ales_, which represent the more expensive bottle beers,
are analytically of much the same character as the Light Bitters, except
that the figures all round are much higher. The _Stouts_, as a rule, are
characterized by a high gravity, and contain relatively more solids (as
compared with alcohol) than do the heavy beers of light colour. With
regard to the proportions of the various matters constituting the
extractives (solids) in English beers, roughly 20-30% consists of
maltose and 20-50% of dextrinous matter. In mild ales the proportion of
maltose to dextrin is high (roughly 1:1), thus accounting for the full
sweet taste of these beers. Pale and stock ales, on the other hand,
which are of a "dry" character, contain relatively more dextrin, the
general ratio being about 1:1-1/2 or 1:2. The mineral matter ("ash") of
beers is generally in the neighbourhood of 0.2 to 0.3%, of which about
one-fourth is phosphoric acid. The proteid ("nitrogenous matters")
content of beers varies very widely according to character and strength,
the usual limits being 0.3 to 0.8%, with an average of roughly 0.4%.
B. CONTINENTAL BEERS.
(Analyses by A. Doemens.)
+----------------------+----------+------------+-------------+
| | Original | | Extractives |
| Description. | Gravity. | Alcohol %. | (Solids) %. |
+----------------------+----------+------------+-------------+
| Munich Draught Dark | 1056.4 | 3.76 | 6.58 |
| " " " | 1052.6 | 3.38 | 6.45 |
| " " Light | 1048.0 | 3.18 | 5.55 |
| " " " | 1048.1 | 4.05 | 3.92 |
| " Export | 1054.3 | 3.68 | 6.32 |
| " " | 1059.5 | 4.15 | 7.48 |
| " Bock Beer[9] | 1076.6 | 4.53 | 10.05 |
| Pilsener Bottle | 1047.7 | 3.47 | 4.90 |
| " Draught | 1044.3 | 3.25 | 4.58 |
| Berlin Dark | 1055.2 | 3.82 | 6.17 |
| " Light | 1056.5 | 4.36 | 5.46 |
| " Weissbier | 1033.1 | 2.644 | 3.01 |
+----------------------+----------+------------+-------------+
It will be seen that, broadly speaking, the original gravity of German
and Austrian beers is lower than that of English beers, and this also
applies to the alcohol. On the other hand, the foreign beers are
relatively very rich in solids, and the extractives: alcohol ratio is
high. (See BREWING.)
C. AMERICAN BEERS AND ALES.
(Analyses by M. Wallerstein.)
+------------------------+----------+------------+-------------+
| | Original | | Extractives |
| Description. | Gravity. | Alcohol %. | (Solids) %. |
+------------------------+----------+------------+-------------+
| Bottom \ 1. | 1046.7 | 3.48 | 5.08 |
| Fermentation | 2. | 1055.6 | 3.56 | 6.50 |
| Beers | 3. | 1063.4 | 4.12 | 7.43 |
| (Lager Type). / 4. | 1046.0 | 2.68 | 5.96 |
| 5. | 1051.7 | 3.42 | 5.86 |
+------------------------+----------+------------+-------------+
| Top Fermentation \ 1. | 1084.2 | 5.89 | 8.60 |
| Ales | 2. | 1073.5 | 6.46 | 5.69 |
| (British Type) / 3. | 1068.0 | 5.50 | 5.53 |
+------------------------+----------+------------+-------------+
It will be noted that the American _beers_ (i.e. bottom fermentation
products of the lager type) are very similar in composition to the
German beers, but that the ales are very much heavier than the general
run of the corresponding British products.
_Production and Consumption._--(For manufacture of beer, see BREWING.)
Germany is the greatest beer-producing nation, if liquid bulk be taken
as a criterion; the United States comes next, and the United Kingdom
occupies the third place in this regard. The consumption per head,
however, is slightly greater in the United Kingdom than in Germany, and
very much greater than is the case in the United States. The 1905
figures with regard to the total production and consumption of the three
great beer-producing countries, together with those for 1885, are as
under:--
+----------------+--------------------------------+---------------------+
| | | Consumption per |
| Country. | Total Production (Gallons). | Head of Population |
| | | (Gallons) |
+----------------+------------------+-------------+----------+----------+
| | 1905. | 1885. | 1905. | 1885 |
| +------------------+-------------+----------+----------+
| German Empire | 1,538,240,000 | 932,228,000 | 23.3 | 19.8 |
| United States | 1,434,114,180 | 494,854,000 | 19.9 | 8.8 |
| United Kingdom | 1,227,933,468[10]| 993,759,000 | 27.90[10]| 27.1 |
+----------------+------------------+-------------+----------+----------+
The chief point of interest in the preceding table is the enormous
increase in the United States. In considering the figures, the character
of the beer produced must be taken into consideration. Thus, although
Germany produces roughly 25% more beer in liquid measurement than the
United Kingdom, the latter actually uses about 50% more malt than is the
case in the German breweries. According to a Viennese technical journal,
the quantities of malt employed for the production of one hectolitre (22
gallons) of beer in the respective countries is 0.40 cwt. in the German
empire, 0.72 cwt. in the United States, and 0.81 cwt. in the United
Kingdom. In a sense, therefore, England may still claim pre-eminence as
a beer-producing nation. Large as the _per capita_ consumption in the
United Kingdom may seem, it is considerably less than is the case in
Bavaria, which stands at the head of the list with over 50 gallons, and
in Belgium, which comes second with 47.7 gallons. In the city of Munich
the consumption is actually over 70 gallons, that is to say, about 1-1/2
pints a day for every man, woman and child. It is curious to note that
in Germany, which is usually regarded as a beer-drinking country _par
excellence_, the consumption per head of this article is slightly less
than in England, and that inversely the average German consumes more
alcohol in the shape of spirits than does the inhabitant of the British
Islands (consumption of spirits per head: Germany, 1.76 gallons; United
Kingdom, 0.99 gallons). This is accounted for by the fact that the
peasantry of the northern and eastern portions of the German empire
consume spirits almost exclusively. In the British colonies beer is
generally one of the staple drinks, but if we except Western Australia,
where about 25 gallons per head of population are consumed, the demand
is much smaller than in the United Kingdom. In Australia generally, the
_per capita_ consumption amounts to about 12 gallons, in New Zealand to
10 gallons, and in Canada to 5 gallons. (P. S.)
FOOTNOTES:
[1] London Ales.
[2] Strong Burton Mild Ale.
[3] Fairly representative of "Pale Ales."
[4] Heavy Stock Ales.
[5] Irish Stout.
[6] Nos. 2 and 3 are respectively "single" and "double" London Stouts
from the same brewery.
[7] London Porter or Cooper.
[8] The specific gravity, or "gravity" as it is always termed in the
industry, of the brewer is 1000 times the specific gravity of the
physicist. This is purely a matter of convention and convenience.
Thus when a brewer speaks of a wort of a "gravity" of 1045
(ten-forty-five) he means a wort having a specific gravity of 1.045.
Each unit in the brewer's scale of specific gravity is termed a
"degree of gravity." The wort referred to above, therefore, possesses
forty-five _degrees_ of gravity. The "original gravity," it may here
be mentioned, represents the specific gravity of the wort (see
BREWING) before fermentation. The solids in the original wort may be
ascertained by dividing the excess of the gravity over 1000 by 3.86.
Thus in the case of Mild Ale No. 1 the excess of the original gravity
over 1000 is 1055.13 - 1000 = 55.13. Dividing this by 3.86 we get
14.28, which indicates that the wort from which the beer was
manufactured contained 14.28% of solids. In the trade the gravity of
a beer (or rather of the wort from which it is derived) is generally
expressed in pounds per barrel. This means the excess in weight of a
barrel of the wort over the weight of a barrel of water. The weight
of a barrel (36 gallons) of water is 360 lb.; in the above example
the weight of a barrel of the beer wort is 360 X 1.05513 = 379.8. The
gravity of the wort in lb. is therefore 379.8 - 360 = 19.8. The beer
which is made from this wort would also be called a 19.8 lb. beer,
the reference in all cases being to the original wort.
[9] A particularly heavy beer, only brewed at certain times in the
year.
[10] The maxima of production and consumption were reached in
1899/1900, when the production amounted to 1,337,509,116 gallons (at
the standard gravity) and consumption to 32.28 gallons per head.
BEERSHEBA, a place midway between Gaza and Hebron (28 m. from each),
frequently referred to in the Bible as the southern limit of Palestine
("Dan to Beersheba," Judg. xx. i, &c.) Its foundation is variously
ascribed to Abraham and Isaac, and different etymologies for its name
are suggested, in the fundamental documents of Genesis (xxi. 22, xxvi.
26). It was an important holy place, where Abraham planted a sacred tree
(Gen. xxi. 23), and where divine manifestations were vouchsafed to Hagar
(Gen. xxi. 17), Isaac (xxvi. 24), Jacob (xlvi. 2) and Elijah (1 Kings
xix. 5). Amos mentions it in connexion with the shrines of Bethel and
Gilgal (Amos v. 5) and denounces oaths by its _numen_ (viii. 14). The
most probable meaning of the name is "seven wells," despite the
non-Semitic construction involved in this interpretation. Seven ancient
wells still exist here, though two are stopped up. Eusebius and Jerome
mention the place in the 4th century as a large village and the seat of
a Roman garrison. Extensive remains of this village exist, though they
are being rapidly quarried away for building; some inscriptions of great
importance have been found here. Later it appears to have been the site
of a bishopric; remains of its churches were still standing in the 14th
century. Some fine mosaics have been here unearthed and immediately
destroyed, in sheer wantonness, by the natives quarrying building-stone.
The Biblical Beersheba probably exists at Bir es-Seba', 2 m. distant.
BEESLY, EDWARD SPENCER (1831- ), English historian and positivist, son
of the Rev. James Beesly, was born at Feckenham, Worcestershire, on the
23rd of January 1831. He was educated at Wadham College, Oxford, which
may be regarded as the original centre of the English positivist
movement. Richard Congreve (q.v.) was tutor at Wadham from 1849 to 1854,
and three men of that time, Frederic Harrison (q.v.), Beesly and John
Henry Bridges (1832-1906), became the leaders of Comtism in England.
Beesly left Oxford in 1854 to become assistant-master at Marlborough
College. In 1859 he was appointed professor of history at University
College, London, and of Latin at Bedford College, London, in 1860. He
resigned these appointments in 1893 and 1889, and in 1893 became the
editor of the newly-established _Positivist Review_. He collaborated in
the translation of Comte's system of _Positive Polity_ (4 vols.,
1875-1879), translated his _Discourse on the Positive Spirit_ (1903),
and wrote a biography of Comte for a translation of the first two
chapters of his _Cours de philosophie positive_, entitled _Fundamental
Principles of Positive Philosophy_ (1905). Professor Beesly stood
unsuccessfully as Liberal candidate for Westminster in 1885 and for
Marylebone in 1886, and is the author of numerous review articles on
social and political topics, treated from the positivist standpoint,
especially on the Irish question. His works also include a series of
lectures on Roman history, entitled _Catiline, Clodius, Tiberius_
(1878), in which he rehabilitates in some degree the character of each
of his subjects, and _Queen Elizabeth_ (1892), in the "Twelve English
Statesmen" series.
BEET, a cultivated form of the plant _Beta vulgaris_ (natural order
Chenopodiaceae), which grows wild on the coasts of Europe, North Africa
and Asia as far as India. It is a biennial, producing, like the carrot,
a thick, fleshy tap-root during the first year and a branched, leafy,
flowering stem in the following season. The small, green flowers are
borne in clusters. A considerable number of varieties are cultivated for
use on account of their large fleshy roots, under the names of
mangel-wurzel or mangold, field-beet and garden-beet. The cultivation of
beet in relation to the production of sugar, for which purpose certain
varieties of beet stand next in importance to the sugar cane, is dealt
with under SUGAR. The garden-beet has been cultivated from very remote
times as a salad plant, and for general use as a table vegetable. The
variety most generally grown has long, tapering, carrot-shaped roots,
the "flesh" of which is of a uniform deep red colour throughout, and the
leaves brownish red. It is boiled and cut into slices for being eaten
cold; and it is also prepared as a pickle, as well as in various other
forms. Beet is in much more common use on the continent of Europe as a
culinary vegetable than in Great Britain, where it has, however, been
cultivated for upwards of two centuries. The white beet, _Beta cicla_,
is cultivated for the leaves, which are used as spinach. The midribs and
stalks of the leaves are also stewed and eaten as sea-kale, under the
name of Swiss chard. _B. cicla_ is also largely used as a decorative
plant for its large, handsome leaves, blood red or variegated in colour.
The beet prospers in a rich deep soil, well pulverized by the spade. If
manure is required, it should be deposited at the bottom of the trench
in preparing the ground. The seeds should be sown in drills 15 ins.
asunder, in April or early in May, and the plants are afterwards to be
thinned to about 8 in. apart in the lines, but not more, as
moderate-sized roots are preferable. The plants should grow on till the
end of October or later, when a portion should be taken up for use, and
the rest laid in in a sheltered corner, and covered up from frost. The
roots must not be bruised and the leaves must be twisted off--not
closely cut, as they are then liable to bleed. In the north the crop may
be wholly taken up in autumn, and stored in a pit or cellar, beyond
reach of frost. If it is desired to have fresh roots early, the seeds
should be sown at the end of February or beginning of March; and if a
succession is required, a few more may be sown by the end of March.
BEETHOVEN, LUDWIG VAN (1770-1827), German musical composer, was baptized
(probably, as was usual, the day after birth) on the 17th of December
1770 at Bonn. His family is traceable to a village near Louvain, in
Belgium, in the 17th century. In 1650 a lineal ancestor of the composer
settled in Antwerp. Beethoven's grandfather, Louis, quarrelled with his
family, came to Bonn in 1732, and became one of the court musicians of
the archbishop-elector of Cologne. He was a genial man of estimable
character, and though Ludwig van Beethoven was only four years old when
his grandfather died, he never forgot him, but cherished his portrait to
the end of his life. Beethoven's father, a tenor singer at the
archbishop-elector's court, was of a rough and violent temper, not
improved by his passion for drink, nor by the dire poverty under which
the family laboured. He married Magdelina Leim or Laym, the widow of a
_valet-de-chambre_ of the elector of Trier and daughter of the chief
cook at Ehrenbreitstein. Beethoven's father wished to profit as early as
possible by his son's talent, and accordingly began to give him a
severe musical training, especially on the violin, when he was only five
years old, at about which time they left the house in which he was born
(515 Bonngasse, now preserved as a Beethoven museum, with a magnificent
collection of manuscripts and relics). By the time Beethoven was nine
his father had no more to teach him, and he entered upon a perhaps
healthier course of clavier lessons under a singer named Pfeiffer. A
little general education was also edged in by a certain Zambona. Van den
Eeden, the court organist, and an old friend of his grandfather, taught
him the organ and the pianoforte, and so rapid was Beethoven's progress
that when C.G. Neefe succeeded to Van den Eeden's post in 1781, he was
soon able to allow the boy to act as his deputy. With his permission
Beethoven published in 1783 his earliest extant composition, a set of
variations on a march by Dressler. The title-page states that they were
written in 1780 _"par un jeune amateur Louis van Beethoven age de dix
ans_." Beethoven's father was very clumsy in his unnecessary attempts to
make an infant prodigy of his son; for the ante-dating of this
composition, implying the correct date of birth, contradicts the
post-dating of the date of birth by which he tried to make out that the
three sonatas Beethoven wrote in the same year were by a boy of eleven.
(Beethoven for a long time believed that he was born in 1772, and the
certificate of his baptism hardly convinced him, because he knew that he
had an elder brother named Ludwig who died in infancy.) In the same
year, 1783, Beethoven was given the post of cembalist in the Bonn
theatre, and in 1784 his position of assistant to Neefe became official.
In a _catalogue raisonne_ of the new archbishop Max Franz's court
musicians we find "No. 14, Ludwig Beethoven" described "as of good
capacity, still young, of good, quiet behaviour and poor," while his
father (No. 8) "has a completely worn-out voice, has long been in
service, is very poor, of fairly good behaviour, and married."
In the spring of 1787 Beethoven paid a short visit to Vienna, where he
astonished Mozart by his extemporizations and had a few lessons from
him. How he was enabled to afford this visit is not clear. After three
months the illness of his mother, to whom he was devoted, brought him
back. She died in July, leaving a baby girl, one year old, who died in
November. For five more years Beethoven remained at Bonn supporting his
family, of which he had been since the age of fifteen practically the
head, as his father's bad habits steadily increased until in 1789 Ludwig
was officially entrusted with his father's salary. He had already made
several lifelong friends at Bonn, of whom the chief were Count Waldstein
and Stephan Breuning; and his prospects brightened as the
archbishop-elector, in imitation of his brother the emperor Joseph II.,
enlarged the scale of his artistic munificence. By 1792 the
archbishop-elector's attention was thoroughly aroused to Beethoven's
power, and he provided for Beethoven's second visit to Vienna. The
introductions he and Count Waldstein gave to Beethoven, the prefix "van"
in Beethoven's name (which looked well though it was not really a title
of nobility), and above all the unequalled impressiveness of his playing
and extemporization, quickly secured his footing with the exceptionally
intelligent and musical aristocracy of Vienna, who to the end of his
life treated him with genuine affection and respect, bearing with all
the roughness of his manners and temper, not as with the eccentricities
of a fashionable genius, but as with signs of the sufferings of a
passionate and noble nature.
Beethoven's life, though outwardly uneventful, was one of the most
pathetic of tragedies. His character has had the same fascination for
his biographers as it had for his friends, and there is probably hardly
any great man in history of whom more is known and of whom so much of
what is known is interesting. Yet it is all too much a matter of detail
and anecdote to admit of chronological summarizing here, and for the
disentangling of its actual incidents we must refer the reader to Sir
George Grove's long and graphic article, "Beethoven," in the _Dictionary
of Music and Musicians_, and to the monumental biography of Thayer, who
devoted his whole life to collecting materials. These two biographical
works, read in the spirit in which their authors conceived them, will
reveal, beneath a mass of distressing, grotesque and sometimes sordid
detail, a nobility of character and unswerving devotion to the highest
moral ideas throughout every distress and temptation to which a
passionate and totally unpractical temper and the growing shadow of a
terrible misfortune could expose a man.
The man is surpassed only by his works, for in them he had that mastery
which was denied to him in what he himself calls his attempt to "grapple
with fate." Such of his difficulties as lay in his own character already
showed themselves in his studies with Haydn. Haydn, who seems to have
heard of him on his first visit to Vienna in 1787, passed through Bonn
in July 1792, and was so much struck by Beethoven that it was very
likely at his instigation that the archbishop sent Beethoven to Vienna
to study under him. But Beethoven did not get on well with him, and
found him perfunctory in correcting his exercises. Haydn appreciated
neither his manners nor the audacity of his free compositions, and
abandoned whatever intentions he may have had of taking Beethoven with
him to England in 1794. Beethoven could do without sympathy, but a
grounding in strict counterpoint he felt to be a dire necessity, so he
continued his studies with Albrechtsberger, a mere grammarian who had
the poorest opinion of him, but who could, at all events, be depended on
to attend to his work. Almost every comment has been made upon the
relations between Haydn and Beethoven, except the perfectly obvious one
that Mozart died at the age of thirty-six, just at the time Beethoven
came to Vienna, and that Haydn, as is perfectly well known, was
profoundly shocked by the untimely loss of the greatest musician he had
ever known. At such a time the undeniable clumsiness of Beethoven's
efforts at academic exercises would combine with his general
tactlessness to confirm Haydn in the belief that the sun had set for
ever in the musical world, and would incline him to view with disfavour
those bold features of style and form which the whole of his own
artistic development should naturally have predisposed him to welcome.
It is at least significant that those early works of Beethoven in which
Mozart's influence is most evident, such as the Septet, aroused Haydn's
open admiration, whereas he hardly approved of the compositions like the
sonatas, _op._ 2 (dedicated to him), in which his own influence is
stronger. Neither he nor Beethoven was skilful in expressing himself
except in music, and it is impossible to tell what Haydn meant, or what
Beethoven thought he meant, in advising him not to publish the last and
finest of the three trios, _op._ 1. But even if he did not mean that it
was too daring for the public, it can hardly be expected that he never
contrasted the meteoric career of Mozart, who after a miraculous boyhood
had produced at the age of twenty-five some of the greatest music Haydn
had ever seen, with the slow and painful development of his uncouth
pupil, who at the same age had hardly a dozen presentable works to his
credit. It is not clear that Haydn ever came to understand Beethoven,
and many years passed before Beethoven realized the greatness of the
master whose teaching had so disappointed him.
From the time Beethoven settled permanently in Vienna, which he was soon
induced to do by the kindness of his aristocratic friends, the only
noteworthy external features of his career are the productions of his
compositions. In spite of the usual hostile criticism for obscurity,
exaggeration and unpopularity, his reputation became world-wide and by
degrees actually popular; nor did it ever decline, for as his later
works became notorious for their extravagance and unintelligibility his
earlier works became better understood. He was no man of business, but,
in a thoroughly unpractical way, he was suspicious and exacting in money
matters, which in his later years frequently turned up in his
conversation as a grievance, and at times, especially during the
depreciation of the Austrian currency between 1808 and 1815, were a real
anxiety to him. Nevertheless, with a little more skill his external
prosperity would have been great. He was always a personage of
importance, as is testified by more than one amusing anecdote, like
those of his walks with Goethe and his half-ironical comments on the
hats which flew off more for him than for Goethe; and in 1815 it seemed
as if the summit of his fame was reached when his 7th symphony was
performed, together with a hastily-written cantata, _Der glorreiche
Augenblick_ and the blazing piece of descriptive fireworks entitled
_Wellingtons Sieg oder die Schlacht bei Vittoria_, once popular in
England as the _Battle Symphony_. The occasion for this performance was
the congress of Vienna; and the government placed the two halls of the
Redouten-Saal at his disposal for two nights, while he himself was
allowed to invite all the sovereigns of Europe. In the same year he
received the freedom of the city, an honour much valued by him. After
that time his immediate popularity, as far as new works were concerned,
became less eminent, as that of his more easy-going contemporaries began
to increase. Yet there was, not only in the emotional power of his
earlier works, but also in the known cause of his increasing inability
to appear in public, something that awakened the best popular
sensibilities; and when his two greatest and most difficult works, the
9th symphony and parts of the _Missa Solemnis_, were produced at a
memorable concert in 1824, the storm of applause was overwhelming, and
the composer, who was on the platform in order to give the time to the
conductor, had to be turned round by one of the singers in order to
_see_ it.
Signs of deafness had given him grave anxiety as early as 1708. For a
long time he successfully concealed it from all but his most intimate
friends, while he consulted physicians and quacks with eagerness; but
neither quackery nor the best skill of his time availed him, and it has
been pointed out that the root of the evil lay deeper than could have
been supposed during his lifetime. Although his constitution was
magnificently strong and his health was preserved by his passion for
outdoor life, a post-mortem examination revealed a very complicated
state of disorder, evidently dating almost from childhood (if not
inherited) and aggravated by lack of care and good food. The touching
document addressed to his brothers in 1802, and known as his "will,"
should be read in its entirety, as given by Thayer (iv. 4). No verbal
quotation short of the whole will do justice to the overpowering
outburst which runs almost in one long unpunctuated sentence through the
whole tragedy of Beethoven's life, as he knew it then and foresaw it. He
reproaches men for their injustice in thinking and calling him
pugnacious, stubborn and misanthropical when they do not know that for
six years he has suffered from an incurable condition, aggravated by
incompetent doctors. He dwells upon his delight in human society, from
which he has had so early to isolate himself, but the thought of which
now fills him with dread as it makes him realize his loss, not only in
music but in all finer interchange of ideas, and terrifies him lest the
cause of his distress should appear. He declares that, when those near
him had heard a flute or a singing shepherd while he heard nothing, he
was only prevented from taking his life by the thought of his art, but
it seemed impossible for him to leave the world until he had brought out
all that he felt to be in his power. He requests that after his death
his present doctor, if surviving, shall be asked to describe his illness
and to append it to this document in order that at least then the world
may be as far as possible reconciled with him. He leaves his brothers
his property, such as it is, and in terms not less touching, if more
conventional than the rest of the document, he declares that his
experience shows that only virtue has preserved his life and his courage
through all his misery.
And, indeed, his art and his courage rose far above any level attainable
by those artists who are slaves to the "personal note," for his chief
occupation at the time of this document was his 2nd symphony, the most
brilliant and triumphant piece that had ever been written up to that
time. On a smaller scale, in which mastery was the more easily
attainable as experiment was more readily tested, Beethoven was sooner
able to strike a tragic note, and hence the process of growth in his
style is more readily traceable in the pianoforte works than in the
larger compositions which naturally represent a series of crowning
results. Only in his last period does the pianoforte cease to be
Beethoven's normal means of expression. Accordingly, if in the
discussion of Beethoven's works, with which we close this article, we
dwell rather more on the pianoforte sonatas than on his greater works,
it is not only because they are more easily referred to by the general
reader, but because they are actually a key to his intellectual
development, such as is afforded neither by his life nor by the great
works which are themselves the crowning mystery and wonder of musical
art.
Deafness causes inconvenience in conversation long before it is
noticeable in music, and in 1806 Beethoven could still conduct his opera
_Fidelio_ and be much annoyed at the inattention to his nuances; and his
last appearance as a player was not until 1814, when he made a great
impression with his B flat trio, _op._ 97. At the end of November 1822
an attempt to conduct proved disastrous. The touching incident in 1824
has been described, but up to the last Beethoven seems to have found or
imagined that ear-trumpets (of which a collection is now preserved at
Bonn) were of use to him in playing to himself, though his friends were
often pained when the pianoforte was badly out of tune, and were
overcome when Beethoven in soft passages did not make the notes sound at
all. The instrument sent him by Broadwood in 1817-1818 gave him great
pleasure and he answered it with a characteristically cordial and quaint
letter in the best of bad French. His fame in England was often a source
of great comfort to him, especially in his last illness, when the London
Philharmonic Society, for which the 9th symphony was written and a 10th
symphony projected, sent him L100 in advance of the proceeds of a
benefit concert which he had begged them to give, being in very
straitened circumstances, as he would make no use of the money he had
deposited in the bank for his nephew.
This nephew
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