The ordinary combs may be chopped up, or broken down with the hands, and together with the refuse combs after draining, may be thrown into as much clear water as will cause the wax to swim: the whole may remain in this state for some days to dissolve all the honey for making common mead; or the combs may be spread out upon broad dishes, and set before the bees in an evening, as also the utensils which have been employed during the process, first strewing them over with short straws, to prevent the bees from smearing their wings. The former is the best mode of disposing of the refuse combs and utensils, as the latter is apt to produce quarrelling and robberies.
The combs having been cleared as completely as possible, the finest should be boiled in water enough to float them, till they are thoroughly melted: the melted mass should be poured into a canvass bag, made in the form of a jelly bag, with a draw tape or string at the top, and then be suspended over a tub or pan of cold water. The strings of the bag being tightly drawn, the expression may be effected in various ways. Some press the bag between two strong round sticks, tied or strapped together at their ends, so as to resemble a pair of nut-crackers, with which two persons may by repeatedly stripping down the sides of the bag, express the whole of the wax. Others express it by making an inclined plane of a board about four feet long, placing one end of it in the tub or pan of water, and the other against the breast of the assistant, who puts the bag on the board and passes a round stick firmly down it, as long as the wax will run. A screw press, made hot, would of course answer the purpose better than either of the above modes.
The crumbled combs might be put over the fire, in a steam kettle, with water under it, and the wax which runs through might be afterwards melted again and passed through the bag. The new combs will melt almost entirely; but the old ones, owing to their cells having received so many linings, will preserve their form, the wax running from them but in small quantities.
The vessel used for melting the wax should be capable of containing a good deal more than is put into it, as the contents may boil up suddenly, and occasion loss and inconvenience as well as danger. The wax having been separated from the water in which it was melted, should be remelted with just water enough to prevent burning; and having been well skimmed, may be poured into proper moulds for forming cakes, the vessels being first rinsed with cold water to prevent the wax from adhering to them. The melted wax should be placed near the fire and covered over, to cool gradually, or the cakes will be liable to crack. If it be desirable to have the wax in a very pure state, it may be boiled over and over again with fresh water.
[CHAPTER XXVIII.]
WAX.
Wax is a solid compact unctuous substance, generally of a yellow colour. It is secreted by animals and vegetables, but the vegetable secretion of it is often combined with resin.
Bees-wax may be said to be a concrete animal oil, holding the same relation to the fixed oils that resin does to the essential oils. It is secreted by certain small sacklets on the body of the bee, as occasion requires, for constructing the combs in which the family provision and the young brood are deposited; the wax of commerce is procured by melting down these combs, in the manner already described.