1895 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



17 



bee-keeper (H. R. Boardman), he is a practical 

 taxidermist, having had 18 years' experience. 

 I am sorry that I can not tell you more about 

 him; but he was so modest that I had to pick 

 up what I could. But I can assure you that, 

 like his father, he is one of the bright intelli- 

 gent bee-keepers of the land; but as he has left 

 the apicultural writings wholly to his father, 

 less has been known of him. It is no disparage- 

 ment to the senior France to say that the jun- 

 ior partner is now the active bee-keeper of the 

 firm of E. France & Son. 



You will remember that, on this same trip, I 

 found that M. H. Hunt and R. L. Taylor were 

 making a great success in growing fruit; but I 

 •doubt whether there are any bee-keepers who 

 carry on fruit-growing any more extensively 



/^^ 



ff 



N. E. FRANCE. 



than E. France & .Son. They not only have an 

 «xtensive fruit-ranch, but they grow the very 

 finest and nicest varieties. Every thing gave 

 evidence of having been systematized so that 

 the labor of the hands was reduced to a mini- 

 mum, and the headwork seemed to come from 

 both father and son. so far as I could judge, in 

 about equal pioporiions. 



After sampling the various fruits, Mr. France 

 asked me if I would not like to run over to the 

 powder-mill, that adjoined on another lot. As 

 I expected to go away during the next forenoon 

 I told him I would. The mills are situated in a 

 deep valley, or gorge; and as one enters the 

 place he sees here a building and there another, 



and a little further on still another. At no one 

 point was there the appearance of a very large 

 establishment; but an hour's walk shows that 

 they have an immense plant— one that turns 

 out about a carload of powder every day. I be- 

 lieve it is the second largest In the United 

 States. 



As I was going along one of the walks leading 

 from one mill to another, Mr. France told me 

 that all the employes had to wear shoes fur- 

 nished by the company— that it would never 

 do to have any steel nails in the soles as in or- 

 dinary shoes. Indeed, the rails forming the 

 track of the small railway running from one 

 mill to another (the car drawn by a mule) is 

 made of copper. It is not safe to have steel or 

 iron come in contact with itself. As I ap- 

 proached the door of one mill (every thing was 

 shut down, of course) a kind of nervous fear 

 took possession of me. I remembered that I 

 had steel nails in my shoes, and the thought 

 came to me, -'What, what if I should blow up 

 one of the mills with those steel nails! and how 

 would it look to our readers to hear that I, al- 

 though in good company, had been blown to 

 atoms hereon Sunday i"' When Mr. France 

 showed me where this mill and the other had 

 blown up, and the terrible destruction that had 

 followed in its wake— of the great timbers that 

 had been reduced to kindling-wood, I felt a 

 strong desire to get away. 



Notwithstanding the great danger to the 

 employes, and the fact that working over the 

 powder is very destructive to health, the men 

 keep at the business until they can do nothing 

 else, and death soon overtakes them — not nec- 

 essarily a violent one, but of slow degrees ; 

 and as soon as one is gone there are plenty of 

 applicants for the position. 



The following Monday morning I accom- 

 panied E. France and son out into the home 

 yard, and there we talked over their methods 

 of management. As Mr. France has himself 

 described this in the article on page 932 so fully, 

 I shall not need to repeat it here. 



I had a great curiosity to see those great shot- 

 tower hives. Indeed, they must have been of 

 the appearance of shot- towers when they were 

 made up of two stories, for the frames them- 

 selves, of the standing sort, and spaced with 

 nails, are about 12 x 20 inches, the long way up, 

 and about 9 of them made a brood-nest, and 

 formerly they had an upper story on top of 

 this, of the same capacity. You will not be 

 surprised when I tell you that such colonies 

 used to yield a barrel of honey; but latterly the 

 shot-towers have all been reduced to one story; 

 and while Mr. N. E. France still prefers them 

 to any thing else, the senior France likes the 

 eight-frame Langstroth better, worked in two 

 and three stories. But whether the shot-tower 

 or Langstroth, the hives are all of the quad- 

 ruple type, to save space and to conserve heat 

 in winter, and to render it impossible for do- 



