238 [Skkate 



evening that the beeswax was missing; as it was quite a large piece 

 the whole family became exceedingly alarmed and anxious about the 

 child. The next morning, the fears of the parents were all quieted 

 by finding a goodly portion of the wax floating like tallow on the 

 surface of the water the child had made during the night. 



On looking over the foregoing manuscript, I observe some impor- 

 tant habits and instincts of the bees have been inadvertantly omitted in 

 their proper place, to wit: The nature and use of propolis or bee 

 glue; the cause of some bees having no stings; the cause of swarm- 

 ing; the notices of swarming given by the queens in certain cases; 

 the way and manner the common bees prevent swarming, when their 

 instincts teach them that the season is too far advanced for the bees 

 to form new colonies with safety; the wa} and manner the common 

 bees smother their extra queens under certain circumstances; the fact 

 that many of the drones, when the bees commence their general massa- 

 cre, leave their hives, flee to the fields and perish, rather than be man- 

 gled to death by the cruel workers; and not a word abou* the moth. 

 But, sir, it ought not to be expected that a fair outline of the history 

 of the nature, habits, and instincts of bees can be given in a disserta- 

 tion of ordinary length, where a volume is required to do the subject 

 justice. 



SUBSOILING— SUBSOIL PLOWS. 



BY C. N. BEMENT, ALBANY. 



Heretofore the farmers of this country have cultivated a stul en- 

 riched for ages by the yearly addition of a fresh stratum of mold. 

 From the first existence of vegetation upon the dry land, decayed 

 plants, leaves, &c. have' continually furnished a supply of manure, 

 which the winds and rains have liberally spread abroad. As the sup- 

 ply was annually greater than the consumption, the earth, unexhaust- 

 ed by its productions, increased in fertility. The thick layers of ve- 

 getable mold which covered the face of the earth, was a storehouse 

 of food for plants, and this quality increased by the conversion of 

 wood into ashes by clearing. It is not w^onderful, then, that for some 

 years newly cleared settlements should abound in produce and re- 

 quire little more labor than that of plowing and reaping; for during 

 this period the provision is wasting which for centuries had been ac-- 

 cumulating. But the time will come, and indeed has already come 

 in many sections, where the soil has been exhausted, and is too weak 

 of itself to make plants grow with their former luxuriance. The 

 grand question now presents itself, " how shall this soil be renovated 

 and brought back to its former richness and fertility?" My answer 

 would be, by breaking the under crust, opening and stirring the sub- 

 soil, by which means it so alters and disposes the earth in which 

 plants are rooted, that the radicals shoot more easily and more exten- 



