1895 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



107 



ON THE WAY TO FLORIDA. 



Well, business has been all looked after. I 

 have traveled all over the grounds, from down 

 where the men are cutting ice on the carp-pond, 

 all over the rooms, up stairs and down, through 

 the greenhouses, and given directions for my 

 ■department of the work until every thing seem- 

 ed done for my six-weeks" absence as well as it 

 could be done. 



After half an hour's ride on the ears we were 

 obliged to wait four hours in the evening at 

 ■Grafton, O.. for the train to Cincinnati. Now, 

 we might have sat during the whole four hours 

 in the waiting-room of the depot; but the stove 

 smoked, the room smelled of something more 

 unpleasant than simply coal smoke, and so I 

 told Constance we would see if we could find a 

 place a little more homelike. Just across the 

 track was a hotel, and a pleasant-faced woman 

 seemed to have charge of it. A nice homelike 

 sitting-room was soon placed at onr disposal, 

 with easy-chairs, sofa, and pillows— plenty of 

 lamps, carpets, and all snrrs of homelike' fix- 

 ings. She said there would not be any charge 

 for simply waiting there until the train came, 

 and even tried to refuse the coin I offered her. 

 I, however, insisted that she should take it. I 

 lold her folks couldn't keep a hotel and supply 

 nice warm furnished rooms for nothing. I soon 

 •appropriated the lounsre and pillow, for I very 

 much needed a nap after mv busy day. After 

 my rest I passed the pvening very agreeably 

 with two of my favorite agricultural papprs, 

 the Rural New-Yorker and Country Gentle- 

 man. 



Let me disress enough to say that I have 

 been continually surprispd for some time past 

 to see what an exceedingly valuable paper, for 

 high -pressure sardoning as well as farming, 

 the Rural New-Yorher continues to be. When 

 they put the price down to onlv ?l.on a year, it 

 seemed to me next to impossible that it could 

 te kept up to such a high standard of value: 

 but they have held their own so long that it 

 looks as if they were going to keep it up. Al- 

 though it is weekly in its visits, it seems to me 

 that single issues are frequently worth the 

 price of the whole year. 



I presume the average waiting-rooms in our 

 Tailroad stations are as comfortable as can be 

 afforded under the circumstances; but when- 

 ever there is a hotel near T certainly would will- 

 ingly pay a quarter for the comforts of a home, 

 for two or three hours. 



SOME HINTS ABOUT SHIPPING COMB HONEY. 



In Cincinnati we made a verv pleasant call 

 on C. F. Muth. He and his son are. as usual, 

 busy in the honev business, and perhaps this is 

 •a good time to call attention to the fact that it 

 is risky business trying to shin comb honey 

 during zero weather. Somebody sent friend 

 Muth a shipment, saying that he must have 14 

 cts. for it. He added, further, that, if any of the 

 Taoney was broken in transit. Muth should not 

 receive it from the railroad company, but pro- 

 ceed to make them pay damages for said break- 

 age. Now. there are three mistakes in the 

 above method of doing business. In the first 

 place, there should have been some corres- 

 pondence with Muth before shipping him hon- 

 ■ey; while in fact, as I imderstood it. there was 

 none. Muth adverti«ed. as it seems, to pay 14 

 cts. for first-class white-clover honey; but none 

 of this shipment was first-class, and a consider- 



able portion of it was really third or fourth 

 class. Again, Muth isn't in the commission 

 business. He buys outright; therefore it was 

 out of the question to tell him. after it was 

 shipped, that he could not have it for less than 

 14 cts. Third, no one can make a railroad com- 

 pany pay for honey broken in transit, especial- 

 ly when shipped in zero weather, unless it can 

 be shown that the damage is in consequence of 

 bad handling, and not through any fault of the 

 shipper. Of conrse. friend Muth could have 

 left the honey in the hands of the railroad 

 company; in fact. I do not know but he renders 

 himself liable in taking it from the depot; but 

 quite a little of it was in such shape that it 

 would have been a total loss if Muth had not 

 taken it. put it in stone crocks, and awaited in- 

 structions from the shipper. He told me he 

 would willingly pav the freight and ship it all 

 back to get out of a bad job, if the shipper 

 would accept it. 



One reason why it broke out of the sections 

 was that the honey was not securely fas- 

 tened in by the bees all around. A careful 

 study of the'directiors for managing, in our bre- 

 jourhal, would have led the producer to remedy 

 this matter. In fact, very much of the trouble 

 in shipping honev has been on account of lack 

 of attention in this one respect— getting the 

 bees to fasten the honey securely to the wood 

 of the sections clear around. I fear a good 

 many bee-keepers do not understand this, or 

 may be they have never seen a crop of strictly 

 first-class comb honey. 



While in Cincinnati we were kindly enter- 

 tained by the Rev. Norman Plass. former pas- 

 tor of our church in Medina. He now has 

 charge of the Vine St. Congregational Church, 

 Cincinnati. I was much interested in looking 

 through the church and various rooms for the 

 Sunday-school. Endeavor Society, and other 

 meetings of the young people, and I want to 

 tell you about his 



SUNDAY- SCHOOL THERMOMETER. 



It caught ray eye as soon as I looked into the 

 Sunday-school room, because it seemed to be 

 some sort of scientific instrument. It is sim- 

 ly a piece of wond, in shape, and lettered and 

 graduated similar to a common thermometer- 

 scale, only larger. It is a piece of board per- 

 haps four feet long. Through the center of the 

 board lengthwise a groove is cut about where 

 the glass tube would come in a thermometer. 

 In«tead of a glass tube, however, it has a large 

 round cord stretched on pulleys, one pulley at 

 each end of the scale. This cord, half its 

 length, is dyed or painted black. The other 

 half is left white. The superintendent, by 

 pulling on the cord at the back of the instru- 

 ment, runs what appears to be the column of 

 mercury up or down, and this is the record of 

 attendance. The pupils all watch eagerly to 

 see whether the attendsince on any Sunday is 

 high or low, the figures running from zero to 

 250 or 300°. (In smaller schools, say of 25 or .50, 

 the scale may be made accordingly.) The sec- 

 retary, after he has counted up the pupils, 

 makes the thermometer show the number pres- 

 ent where all can see it, and the high or low 

 temperature, as von will notice, rests entirely 

 on the efforts oif the pupils and teachers. If 

 they want to make the mercury to stand high 

 they must bestir themselves to bring as many as 

 possible. While such an instrument may not 

 indicate exactly the spiritual growth of the 

 school, it at least approximates it. 



When we opened our eyes in the morning we 

 were in the vicinity of Montgomery. Ala.; and 

 as we turned eastward, toward Jacksonville, the 

 deciduous trees began to give place to beautiful 

 varieties of evergreens, pines, and magnolias, 

 with here and there trees of various kinds 



