THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST. 



130 



" I do not think that only a few like 

 this could do much harm," said the 

 friend, "but you can't make me believe 

 tliat if a large number of hungry bees 

 had tried to get the juice of a bunch of 

 grapes they could not do it." 



Just as they were coming near the 

 house, they noticed that a number of 

 bees, having gone home a while before 

 with a load of grape juice, were greedily 

 coming back to the place where barrels 

 of grapes had been left a few minutes, 

 before being taken to the cellar. 



" Now," said the friend, " is our 

 chance." 



They carefully took away everything 

 in which the bees could find grape juice, 

 picked up all the bruised berries scat- 

 tered here and there, and left nothing to 

 eat for the bees but one bunch of 

 perfectly whole grapes. 



The bees at once clustered upon it, 

 and so many were there, that they hid 

 the bunch completely. The friend 

 looked at them with a smile of triumph. 

 Aft«r a while they examined the bunch 

 again ; it was as shiny as a freshly- 

 blackened stove. The bees had rubbed 

 oflf all the bloom, but not one berry 

 was opened. 



The bee keeper then, with a needle, 

 made a small puncture in one of the 

 berries, the bunch was left in the same 

 place, and when examined on the fol- 

 lowing day it was found that the bees 

 had drank the juice as far as their 

 tongues could go, but they hcul not torn 

 the skin open any further. 



I could further say that the bee 

 keepers' society of Bordeaux (France), 

 thinking that bee culture in that local- 

 ity might interfere with the wine in- 

 terests, made continued experiments the 

 whole summer long, with all possible 

 kinds of fruit, with results like the 

 above. I^et me add that the juice of 

 grapes there is much sweeter, and conse- 

 quently more tempting for bees tlian it 



is here. — American Wine and Grape 

 Grower. 



THE BIDWELL STRAWBERRY. 



The Arnerican Agriculturist says : 

 " After a careful inspection of the Bid- 

 well strawberry, on various soils, and 

 in different conditions, we feel like con- 

 gratulating those who have received 

 the plants as premiums. The produc- 

 tiveness of the plant is simply wonder- 

 ful, and that is one great point in the 

 strawberry, while it runs of unusually 

 uniform size. With our present know- 

 ledge, if asked to name a strawberry 

 which we would prefer to the Bidwell 

 to send out as premiums, we could not 

 do it, as we do not know of any one 

 berry that we can so confidently recom- 

 mend for general cultivation. The lead- 

 ing strawberry of the hist two years 

 has been the " Sharpless," and an 

 admirable fruit it has proved to be. The 

 markets are an excellent test of the 

 value of a fruit, and the Sharpless has 

 appeared in great abundance. As 

 compared to the Bidwell, we should 

 say that it did not equal that in pro- 

 ductiveness, and was not so firm for 

 shipping — still the Sharpless will long 

 hold a prominent place in the list of 

 first-class strawberries." Purdy^s Fruit 

 Recorder says : " We obtained from 

 three different parties in Michigan, all 

 of whom had their plants direct from 

 Bidwell, fifteen thousand plants. Then 

 to make sure that our plants were the 

 same as Mr. Roe's, (who is properly 

 and carefully cautioning the public 

 against spurious plants), a friend order- 

 ed from him a few plants, which were 

 set on our grounds. The three lots 

 from Micliigan and those from Mr. Roe 

 have all proved the same, so we do not 

 question the purity and genuineness of 

 our plants, and further the shape of the 

 fruit is of that peculiar cast shown in 

 the drawing given by us, which was 

 copied from the American Agriculturist, 



