370 



THE GARDENER'S MONTHLY 



[December, 



Literature, Travels \ Personal Notes. 



COMMUNICA riONS. 



NOTES AND QUERIESNo. 7. 



BY JACQUES. 



Scientific and historical researches are leading 

 men to curious discoveries. Xot the least will 

 be found in the Contemporary Review for Sept., 

 1870, Francois Lenormant has an article on 

 "The First Sin," in which an attempt is made 

 to name the sacred plant of the fruit of which 

 Adam and Eve ate, from Assyrian has I'eliefs, 

 etc., and the writer even gives the botanical 

 designation. He says : "It is invariably a plant 

 of moderate size, of pyramidal form, having a 

 straight stem, from which spring numerous 

 branches, and a cluster of large leaves at its 

 base. In one example only is the plant rep- 

 resented with sufficient accuracy to enable us to 

 classify it as the Asclepias acida, or Sarcostem- 

 ma viminalis, the plant known as Soma, etc." 

 Here is curious speculation indeed, and the 

 whole article is recommended to botanists and 

 others. 



Honey Making in the United States. — I trans- 

 fer from the Popular Science Monthly the follow- 

 ing, which is not only deeply interesting, but 

 will be new to many : " The annual production 

 of honey in this country is estimated at about 

 35,000,000 pounds, and the business of bee-keep- 

 ing is being rapidly systematized. One firm of 

 wholesale grocers in New York keeps as many 

 as 12,000 swarms ; other keepers have often 

 from 3,500 to 5,000 swarms. Arrangements are 

 made with farmers and owners of orchards to 

 allow an apairy of a certain number of swarms 

 to be placed in their grounds. At the distance 

 of three or four miles another apiary is placed 

 with another farmer, and so on. For this ac- 

 commodation the bee-keepers pay either in 

 money or in shares. It is estimated that on an 

 average, an acre will support twenty-five swarms, 

 yielding fifty pounds of honey each. The apia- 

 ries are cared for by men in the employ of the 

 bee-owners. Many ingenious contrivances have 

 been introduced for the purpose of saving the 



labor of the bees and the keepers. ■ About ten 

 years ago a German suggested that thin corru- 

 gated sheets of wax, which lie called ' artificial 

 tablets,' should be provided for the bees to 

 make their comb from. These, however, did 

 not come into general use ; but a few years ago 

 Mr. W. M. Hoge effected an improvement by 

 starting the side-walls of the cells. When these 

 'foundations,' as they are called, were present- 

 ed to the bees, the intelligent little creatures at 

 once took advantage of them, and extended the 

 side walls so as to form the regular hexagonal 

 cell. The machine by which the impression is 

 made on both sides of the wax is very simple^ 

 and somewhat resembles a clothes-wringer, only 

 the iron rollers are studded with little hexagonal- 

 headed pins just the size of the section of a cell, 

 so that when the thin sheet of wax is pressed up 

 between the pegs to the height of about one- 

 sixteenth of an inch, it offers a substance for the 

 construction of the cell-walls. Another remark- 

 able adaptation of machinery is afforded by the 

 use of a rotating frame, which causes the cells 

 of the comb placed in it, to be emptied b}' cent- 

 rifugal force. The empty uninjured comb is re- 

 placed in the hive, and again used by the bees. 

 As about three-fourths of the time of the bees, 

 it has been computed, is taken up in the con- 

 struction of the comb, it will be seen that by these 

 contrivances a great saving of bee labor is ef- 

 fected." 



Take care of the weeds. — It has been found, says 

 the American Agriculturist ^ by careful and patient 

 counting the number of perfect seeds produced 

 in a number of seed-pods, that on a single plant 

 of Purslane, Portulaca oleracea, there will be 

 1,000,000,000,000 as the seeds of the second gene- 

 ration from a single plant, or a seed for every 

 square foot of 23,000,000 acres. 



I Rare Trees. — Scribner''s Magazine for Novem- 

 ber has an excellent article on rare and weep- 

 ing trees. It is a good sign that such notices are 

 acceptable to the public. We could wish that 

 the weeping Sophora were more plentiful. Why 

 does not somebody prepare for planters the 



