The morals of our favorites are here a good deal at fault, for the strongest hives, when their inordinate passion is thus stirred up by the carelessness or want of knowledge of the bee-keeper, attack and prey upon the weak. To be "forewarned is to be forearmed"--and "prevention is better than cure." We strongly recommend closely covering up the feeder; one of the middle size bell glasses put over it makes a close fitting cover, should the regular cover to the hive not be sufficiently tight: when bees are not kept in a bee-house--and are on that account more accessible--this extra care is more particularly needed. The right time for feeding is in the autumn or spring. A stock of bees at Michaelmas ought to weigh 20 lbs. exclusive of the hive, and if then it weigh less, the deficiency should be made up by artificial food. It is not wise to defer doing this until later in the season, because it is important that when the food is placed in the cells, the bees should seal it up, and a tolerably warm temperature is required to enable them to secrete the wax for the delicately formed lids of the cells. If the food remain unsealed, there is danger of its turning sour and thereby causing disease among the bees. It is not well to feed in mid-winter or when the weather is very cold. Bees at such times consume but little food, being in a state of torpor, from which it is better not to arouse them. A little food in the spring stimulates the queen to lay more abundantly, for bees are provident, and do not rear the young so rapidly when the supplies are short. In this particular the intelligence of bees is very striking; they have needed no Malthus to teach them that the means of subsistence must regulate the increase of a prosperous population: "The prescient female rears the tender brood In strict proportion to the hoarded food."--Evans. Judgment has, however, to be exercised by the apiarian in giving food, for it is quite possible to do _mischief by over feeding_. The bees when over-fed will fill so many of the combs with honey that the queen in the early spring cannot find empty cells in which to deposit her eggs, and by this means the progress of the hive is much retarded, a result that should be guarded against.