Feb. 14, 1901. 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



101 



France, for it is a neat, newsy, and practical farmer's pa- 

 per, full of interesting information. The trip to Meulaii 

 reminded me ver3' much of " L'Abbe Constantin,'" by Hal- 

 evy. I have no doubt many of the readers of the American 

 Bee Journal have read that little book, for it has been trans- 

 lated into English and has become a classic. 



Well, the kindly, good-humored cure, his old servant, 

 his little garden, the little church, the little village, and 

 even the big castle at a short distance on the opposite side 

 of the road — all these things lookt familiar altho seen for 

 the first time. We found ourselves there with Mr. Giraud. 

 whom I have mentioned as so successfully putting in prac- 

 tice the Doolittle method of queen-rearing, and wjth an old 

 gentleman — a count who kept bees for pleasure — and we had 

 quite a talk on America and our American celebrities in 

 bees. If I am not mistaken, two of the persons present 

 could read English and had read Gleanings and a few copies 

 of the American Bee Journal and " A B C of Bee Culture." 

 Why it is that so few of the French can speak or read Eng- 

 lish is more than I can comprehend, but they seem to think 

 it much more astonishing that not all foreigners can speak 

 French. They seem to think that the French language 

 ought to be an indispensable part of any good education. 



Entrance Gale to the City of Cliartres. France. 



I think this makes the French more exclusive than other 

 nations. Then their literature seems to encourage them 

 in their ideas of exclusiveness, for it is certainly very 

 ■wealthy in able works and books which have become clas- 

 sics, and more translations seem to be made from the 

 French than from any other tongue. 



We left Meulan after a very pleasant chat and a visit 

 to the fine park of the castle across the way. 



What a difference between European and American 

 landscapes 1 I vainly tried to imagine myself in America, 

 at different times. There was always something in sight 

 to dispel the illusion. The village houses huddled together 

 as in a nest ; the white walls and red tile roofs ; the mag- 

 nificent country roads with their avenues of trees on each 

 side : the little patches of land looking for all the world 

 like so many handkerchiefs lying side by side in the sun : 

 the smooth little streams of water, running quietly even 

 the full to the edge of their grassy shores, and shaded with 

 willows and poplars along their windings ; the herded 

 cattle, the two-wheel carts and thair heavy loads, even the 

 country buggies, showed me that this was another world. 

 O, those buggies 1 What a look of contempt our farmer 

 boys would give them 1 They are not buggies, but carts 

 very gaudily painted, but so heavy ! Wheels five feet high, 

 shafts made of 4x4 timbers, springs to suit, harness ditto. 

 and a big Percheron for a trotter. I nowhere saw one of 

 our American spider-web buggies. I have no doubt that 

 there are some in Paris, yet they must be scarce. There 

 are plenty of fine carriages, and expensive equipages, but 

 you can not, on the public roads, meet a light top-buggy at 

 every turn. Their lightest buggies are made to last, and 

 are heavy in every particular. This seems an absurditv. 

 for such vehicles as we use here, on our abominable Ameri- 

 can roads, would be a delight over there. The harness also 

 is heavy. It seems as if they were afraid the horse would 

 break it, and there is enough leather in the lightest harness 

 to make three such harnesses as our buggy-horses wear. 



A Few Words of Comfort for " Old Grimes." 



BV •'THE MILI.EK ()' THE DEE." 



SO the old ballad has it, but it now seems that he was not 

 dead, but sleeping — aye, sleeping long years, like Rip 

 Van Winkle, and he has only just awakened. (See 

 page 2(1.) Poor, sleepy Old Grimes, who would have thought 

 that one of your kindly, genial, helpful nature would have 

 put even the semblance of discouragement in the way of 

 any one, even of one so lost to all rectitude as to try to in- 

 vent new devices in beedom ? 



You kindly old men did, indeed, beat paths for thereat 

 to follow, even as our forefathers blazed the rude trail to the 

 frontier ; but who now would care to stumble over the logs 

 and stones of such paths, vphen the same end may quickly 

 be reacht by automobile ? Those old paths are full of 

 pretty places, romantic spots and picturesque corners where 

 wild flowers lend their sweetness and the drowsy hum of 

 the bumble-bee invites one to tarry and repose. We all 

 love those places to rest in, and the companionship of the 

 placid plodder of these byways, but they are not for pres- 

 ent-day commerce, nor can we travel over them in up-to- 

 date vehicles. 



The feeling which caused you, dear Old Grimes, to com- 

 plain, is but a sound and safe conservatism allowed to run 

 riot. But then, we must needs be charitable to you, for 

 your article clearly shows that you have in mind only the 

 devices shown in ancient times, and which indeed needed 

 bees from fairy-land to construct combs for use in them. 



What a nightmare your dreams have been, for now, just 

 half awake, you mutter of slicing-machines, of hills atid 

 hollows, of long adjusting, of high prices, of revolutions, 

 of systems, of new outfits, and other fits and misfits. 

 Come, come, Father Grimes, take a cold plunge, shake thy- 

 self and awake, for thou art still more than half asleep. 

 Thy ideas and reasoning bespeak of cobwebs in thy brain, 

 and are not worthy the 20th century. 



'Tis far from the thoughts of these troublesome invent- 

 ive fellows to put obstacles in the paths of you old fellows 

 — no, no .' they would much rather help you into the broad, 

 smooth highway, and when you longingly turn from its 

 rush and bustle into the sweet, tho sleepy, quiet of the old 

 paths, they would furnish you with a rugged cane to help 

 your tottering steps over its stones and hummocks. 



I know a little about some of these new-fangled ma- 

 chines, and to save you from further worry let me whisper 

 to j'ou that an uncapper costing S20, and that has to be "ad- 

 justed," is as far from the realized dreams of those ingen- 

 ious fellows as you can imagine. No, the}' do not cost 

 nearly so much, and their capacious maw will take all the 

 combs as they come, and deliver them to you neatly iincapt, 

 and at the rate of 20 a minute, if your trembling hands can 

 feed them in so fast. 



Dear r)lri Grimes, we all love you for your kindly chari- 

 ties, and for that quaint figure in its "old black coat, all 

 buttoned down before," even tho the color is now rather 

 gray from the dust of many years. 



So let us help you as you tread 



That path of olden times ; 



All undisturbed, rest in thy rut 



For evermore, Old Grimes. 



Getting Bees to Swarm— Requeening, Etc. 



BV EDWIN BEVINS. 



LAST spring I discovered a means of getting bees to 

 swarm at almost any time when swarms are desirable. 

 One of my colonies was wintered in two sections of a 

 sectional 8- frame hive, sections 7's inches deep. Early in 

 May the colony got so strong that in order to prevent 

 swarming I placed another section under, filled with drawn 

 combs. When supering time came, I raised the upper story 

 and put a queen-excluder under them, then shook the bees 

 from every frame down in front of the entrance. I felt sure 

 the queen was below, and expected the brood in the upper 

 story to mature and make room for honey to be stored there 

 by the time there would be much tg store. 



No further attention was paid to these bees for several 

 days until one day a neighbor exprest a desire to look over 

 the apiary. In showing him around I happened to raise the 

 cover of the hive and lift some of the combs. To my sur- 

 prise I found brood in all stages of development, and every 



