304 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Apr. 15. 



State, rambled about the streets of the Southern 

 California metropolis one wet night until they 

 brought up at the building of the Y. M. C. A. 

 One of them proposed that the interior of the 

 fine building be inspected by the quartette. The 

 motion prevailed, and M. H. Mendleson. J. H. 

 Martin (Rambler), W. W. Bliss, and the writer 

 were shown about the various well-appointed 

 rooms by the obliging secretary. We saw many 

 interesting things; we managed to get the 

 Rambler into several scrapes, but we will be 

 charitable enough for the present not to give 

 give him away too severely. 



There is one thing I must tell, however; and 

 that is, the fun we had with the lung-tester 

 in the gymnasium of the institution. We all 

 knew what a hard blower Rambler was, from 

 seeing his work in " Gleanings." We there- 

 fore expected to see him do his level best to 

 raise the roof ofif the Y. M. C. A. building that 

 ni^ht, notwithstanding the fact that it was 

 raining as it had never done before in the City 

 of the Angels. Well, the secretary showed bee- 

 keeper Bliss how to send the air-tank skyward, 

 and the latter proceeded to exhale into the re- 

 ceiver. Higher and higher went the miniature 

 " gasometer." It began to look as if the roof would 

 have to give way to let the top of the receiver 

 escape in its upward tendency. Fortunately for 

 the building, the contents of Mr. Bliss' lungs 

 gave out before any great strain was exerted on 

 the aforesaid roof. Then it came Rambler's 

 turn. He was not going to be outdone by Bliss 

 — oh, no! that would never do. So, throwing 

 back his manly shoulders, he inhaled a full com- 

 plement of the San Francisco air that then per- 

 vaded Los Angeles, and proceeded to exhale it 

 into the tester. Upward went the tank. The 

 trio stood back aghast as they saw the little 

 " gasometer " mount toward the ceiling. Was 

 the Rambler going to outdo those Californians 

 who had been living on California ozone for 

 years past? No; our good friend Rambler had 

 not reached that lung power that the average 

 healthy Southern Caliiornian is blessed with. 

 Bliss was in the lead by many cubic inches. Then 

 the other members of the party tried the tester. 

 They all beat the Rambler, but Bliss remained 

 the champion blower of the crowd. And yet. 

 Rambler was not satisfied. His well-known am- 

 bition to beat every thing in sight now asserted 

 itself. He blew up the receiver again; but the 

 register failed to record many more cubic inches 

 than it did the first time he tried it. The others 

 tried to beat their former record, but with little 

 satisfaction. When the hour came for the visit- 

 ors to take their departure, Rambler looked the 

 picture of despair. For once his record as a 

 champion blower was broken. As we wended 

 our way to the hotel where we were all staying, 

 the ex-champion was non-communicative. For a 

 full half -hour he lived within himself. 



The next morning all the party, except Bliss, 

 who sallied forth early in the morning to duly 

 celebrate the victory he won over Rambler the 

 previous night, started to take in the town. It 

 was a mean, wet morning; we were all without 

 umbrellas. The Rambler, even, forgot to bring 

 his faithful rain-shedder along with him when 

 he left home a few days before. I think it was 

 Mr. Mendleson who suggested that we buy a 

 job lot of parasols. Umbrellas, in Los Angeles, 

 are called parasols, for the reason that they sel- 

 dom have much rain to speak of there; and as 

 they have any amount of sunshiny weather, the 

 umbrellas serve as excellent sun-shades. Well, 

 as I was going to say, we invested in a lot of 

 umbrellas. They were of family size, and were 

 all alike. As we three walked the main streets 

 of the city abreast, we were a sight to behold. 

 Our three wide-spreading umbrellas took up 

 nearly the full width of the sidewalk. The won- 



der is, that we were not taken to jail for ob- 

 structing the street. 



W. W. BLTSS; SUMAC AND FRUIT. 



Speaking of Bliss a while ago having such 

 strong lungs impels me to say a word about that 

 gentleman, which I think will not be uninter- 

 esting to the readers of Gleanings. 



I did not leave Los Angeles without paying 

 him a visit. He had pressed me for a few years 

 back to visit him when I should take in the 

 southern portion of our State. He lives at a 

 place called Duarte, it taking its title from the 

 given name of the original Mexican settler, who 

 was given a grant of land taking in a good sec- 

 tion of the country thereabout. l3uarte is some- 

 thing of a rival of beautiful Riverside as an un- 

 rivaled orange locality. I learned from Mr. 

 Bliss that he came to Los Angeles with his 

 mother some years ago. He had been troubled 

 with weak lungs. In fact, it was thought that 

 his life was not worth much at one time before 

 he came to this State. The air of his native 

 Michigan was too severe for his delicate lungs. 

 He came here; and the change that came over 

 him was marvelous, as those who saw the way 

 he can raise a lung-tester consider him one of 

 the strongest-lunged men in the State. 



When Mr. Bliss came to this State he knew 

 nothing about bees. He fell in with Mr. E. E. 

 Shattuck, for years one of the most prominent 

 apiarists of the country. He soon became an ex- 

 pert bee-keeper. Being of an inventive turn of 

 mind he devised many contrivances that helped 

 to make work in the apiary less burdensome. 

 When land was yet cheap in the foot-hills he 

 took up a government claim. He soon bought 

 out some of his neighbors, so lo-day he has a 

 little over three hundred acres of hill land. He 

 has cleared off something like 40 acres of this 

 and has planted it to fruit-trees, which have 

 been in bearing for a couple of years. He grows 

 mostly apricots and French prunes. These are 

 dried, and sold to local dealers who ship them 

 to the East and other points. He told me that 

 he would soon clear off more of the land and set 

 out additional fruit-trees, mostly oranges. His 

 location is a particularly warm one. Tomato 

 vines are seldom injured by frost. I saw mul- 

 berry-trees on his place on the 10th of February, 

 that had already made six inches of new wood. 

 The same trees here have not yet commenced to 

 leaf out ; their buds are, however, bursting 

 open. 



Mr. Bliss is no longer engaged in active api- 

 cultural pursuits. He makes comb foundation, 

 and deals to a small extent in apiarian supplies. 

 His machinery was, I am told, all of A. I. Root's 

 manufacture. When asked why he gave up bee- 

 keeping he replied that, when he first located 

 on the bee-range where he now resides, the 

 white sage bloomed at a different time than the 

 sumac, with which the hills in his neighborhood 

 abound. But during the later years that he kept 

 an apiary, the sumac bloomed at the same time 

 that the white sage did. The consequence was, 

 the two kinds of honey were stored together. 

 This resulted in the beautiful white-sage honey 

 being badly discolored. Sumac honey is of a 

 dark color, and does not bring near the price the 

 former does. For this reason he decided that it 

 was more profitable to raise fruit. From the 

 way honey sold in this State the last season, I am 

 sure he could have sold all the dark honey his 

 bees might have stored, at a fair price. I should 

 say that the vicinity is yet a good one for an 

 apiary, although the'sumac is liable to bloom at 

 a time when the sage is at its best. A good deal 

 of the land thereabout is already planted to 

 oranges and deciduous fruits. Some horticultur- 

 ists are rooting out their deciduous fruit-trees 

 and planting oranges instead. This same thing 



