"After having covered your head with a veil, if the swarm has settled in a difficult place, and you are afraid of being stung, you hold the hive under the cluster of bees and make them fall into it, either by shaking the branch to which the swarm is attached, very hard, or by means of a small broom, or even with the hand, for then they very rarely sting: it is hardly ever necessary to take any precautions in approaching them, except for swarms which have been fixed for many hours, or since the day before. When the bees have fallen in a mass to the bottom of the hive, you turn this gently over, and place it on a piece of linen stretched out on the ground near the place where the swarm was, or on a tray, or simply on the ground itself, if it is dry and clean. You will have taken care to place on this linen a little wedge, a stick or a stone, to raise the hive a little, and to leave room through which the bees may enter. A great part of the bees which fall into the hive fix themselves on to its sides; but a good number are dropped on the linen when the hive is turned. This is the manner in which you act when it is determined to lodge the swarm; but when the swarm is to be lodged in another hive, as we shall see farther on, immediately that the bees recognise the lodging which is destined for them, they set to work to beat to arms, and to enter in a compact column their new dwelling; those which are fluttering about in the air are summoned by this call, and are not long in alighting on the spot where the rest of their companions are fixed. At the end of a quarter or half an hour, at the most, all, or nearly all, have entered the hive. A few still hover about round the place where the swarm was fixed. If the number is considerable, and if many have stopped in this place, you must make them quit it by placing some offensive herb, such as celandine, horehound, field camomile, &c., on it, or project the smoke of a rag upon them, which will drive away the bees and force them to look for the colony or to return to the mother-hive. You may also project smoke, but in moderate quantities, on the bees grouped around and on the borders of the lodging which you have just given them, and which they will not be long in entering."[96] [96] "Cours d'Apiculture," pp. 73, 74. [Illustration: Fig. 324.--Taking a swarm.] [Illustration: Fig. 325.--Bell-shaped hive.] [Illustration: Fig. 326.--English hive.]