By all the old methods, the cluster of bees is divided by the sheets of comb, which is a great hindrance to successful wintering. In such cases the bees cannot cluster compactly together, but are spread out between the different sheets of comb. In the Controllable Hive, and on the plan of wintering here recommended, the bees in very cold weather cluster in the space between the wire cloth of the ventilator and the top of the frames of the brood section. They are here able to keep up the required amount of animal heat, as they can cluster compactly, without anything to separate them. By the ordinary plan, in sudden turns of very cold weather, the bees between the outer combs are often frozen to death. "Oh!" says some one, "that's all humbug; you can't freeze a bee." Certainly you can. To satisfy yourself of this, after a very cold turn of weather, look under your box hives, if you have them, or any patent hive having a loose bottom board to admit of an examination, and see if you do not find hundreds of bees which have fallen dead from the outside combs. I have examined hundreds of stocks, and found them as here described. If you don't believe a bee will freeze, take out a dozen from a hive, in a severely cold spell of weather in mid-winter, confine them in a box, and set them out doors, letting them remain only one night. See if they are not dead beyond resuscitation, the next morning. This notion that bees will not freeze is a great mistake, and has led to some very foolish experiments in wintering them. A swarm of bees of average size, put in proper condition for winter, will not freeze; but from this it does not follow that a bee is proof against the greatest possible degree of cold. When bees are prepared for winter, as herein directed, they will, as before stated, cluster compactly together. And as the cold increases the cluster will contract, in accordance with the increasing of the cold, and consequently no loss of bees occur.