189(1 



GLEAXINGtS IN BEE CUJ/JIM? K. 



877 



thick r than ono of tlio othors. would liukl all 

 rigiit. After 1 had the whole thins c()iM])leted 

 I found that the upper one of these stones had 

 broken in the middle, but still 1 thought the 

 under one would hold. This was not to be. 

 however, for at the end of two weeks the other 

 broke; and as four of the other stone were more 

 or less conueeted with it, they came down also. 

 This caused a third of the whole to cave in. 

 which made a lot of li'oulile and much extra 

 work, besides some fears that tlie whole stone 

 might not hold. In a week's time I had it back 

 again as good as ever; and as it has been over 

 two months now since it was completed the last 

 time. I tliink tiiere will be no further trouble 

 from its caving in. If not, this cellar will be 

 hei-e years after I am dead and gone, and for 

 all time, so far as 1 can see, unless some one 

 tears it down. 



WAX-EXTKACTORS. 



Now. friend Ernest Root, if 1 undei-stand \our 

 description of how you make the Doolittle .solar 

 wax-extractor aright, and I think I do. when 

 putting th(^ description and the engraving to- 

 gether you have spoiled one o( ihv most valu- 

 able features of it. If I am right, your glass- 

 frame drops down J4 inch into the rabbets made 

 in the sides of the extractor to receive it. This 

 necessitates the lifting of the frame up bodily 

 in order to remove it, or to do any of the manip- 

 ulating of wax or scraps In putting in or remov- 

 ing, while all that I do with mini? is to lift one 

 end of the sash a little by taking hold of No. 11 

 and slide it a little to the front or back: slide it 

 back and on again; No. 4 and the extractoi' 

 making a track for it to slide upon. The glass 

 sash or frame is not removed from my extractor 

 in one manipulation out of twenty. Well, why 

 not remove it? Because it is more work, for 

 one thing; but the main reason is, that in all 

 times of scarcity the bees will collect in swai'ms 

 about this extractor in less than a minute after 

 the cover is raised so as to let out the jji'ifume 

 of the wax; and every bee which is shut in the 

 extractor is dead in a twinkling. With my sash 

 I can slide it under the hovering bees, and 

 manipulate it quicker also, which will be im- 

 possible to do with a sash that must be lifted 

 with every nuinipulation. After I learned to 

 slide the sash I did not murder one bee whei-e I 

 did hundreds before. G. M. Doolitti.e. 



Borodino, N. Y., Dec. 1. 



I suppose, friend D., you still adhere to the 

 plan of having no ventilators in your bee-cellar. 

 When you spoke of the water condensing on the 

 inside of the stones, it occurrod to me that the 

 right amount of ventilation would remove all 

 this water. But then we come right on to a 

 difficulty in all such structures. It is this: 

 vVhenever we lri\'e a warm spell so that the 

 outside air is ivivnncr than the air. stones, etc., 

 in your cellar, if your ventilators are open, 

 moisture will be deposited over every thing. A 

 few days ago our new machine-shop was filled 

 with machinery ready to start, before any heat 

 had been put into the building. The weather 

 suddenly changed from freezing to a warm, 

 damp south wind. The tools and walls of the 

 new shop were a good deal coldei- than this 

 damp air. Tiie coiisecjuence was, eviu'y time 

 we opened a door or window, great drojjs of 

 water appeared on all the metal work; and be- 

 fore we could stop it our whole lot of nice ma- 

 chinery was covered with rust. A lot of boys 

 went to woik with waste and oil. imt it did us 



a great deal of damage. (Ji-egory. in his squash- 

 book, speaks of the same thing in his house for 

 keeping squash(>s, and he directs to shut up the 

 building air-tight (or as near as you can) when- 

 evei' there is a damp air outside, of a higher 

 temperature than the air inside. This neces- 

 sitates careful watching and prompt opening 

 and closing of ventilators. It seems to me. 

 however, that this is next to impossible with a 

 bee-cellar; therefore I would do as you do— shut 

 the whole thing up as tight as I could and let it 

 alone. And I am not sure but I would do the 

 same thing with potatoes and other vegetables 

 in a cellar. When the cellar is too vHirm, how- 

 ever, I would advise opening the doors and 

 windows long enough for it to cool off to the 

 desin^d point. But I would do this only during 

 very di'y or freezing weather. As soon as it 

 begins to frecv.e in the open- air, the surplus 

 molstiu-e is practically done away with. Now, 

 I suspect one of the troubles with sub-earth 

 ventilation is in this line. Air that comes up 

 through an underground passage will, as a 

 matter of conr.se, be filled with moisture; and 

 it would be just the condition to make every 

 thing rot and decay that it comes in contact 

 with, just as it made your boards and rafters 

 rot and decay. In cold-storage buildings they 

 have an arrangement to take all the moisture 

 out of the air so as to have no dampness on the 

 walls and fruits and vegetables; but it is a 

 somewhat complicated and expensive arrange- 

 ment. Putting a stove into the bee-cellar, and 

 drying it off, will, of course, fix it; and had we 

 set up some stoves in our machine-shop, and 

 warmed up the walls and the metal work 

 promptly, it would have saved the rusting, and 

 probably paid for the expense of putting up the 

 stoves or something equivalent. I have taken 

 some space to go over this, because it is an im- 

 portant matter; and much damage is often done 

 in the way I have indicated. It is just like the 

 '• sweat " on the outside of a pitcher that con- 

 tains cold water from the ^^•ell, or ice watei-. 

 Every little while somebody lifts up his hands 

 in astonishment because the contents of a cellar 

 or certain i-oom are dripping wet; and most 

 peoi)le regard it as one of the strange mysteries. 

 The whole thing, however, is very simple, and 

 easy to manage, if we recollect that dew is al- 

 ways deposited copiously when warm damp air 

 sti'ikes any cold body. 



In regard to the wax-extractoi-. Ernest replies 

 as follows: 



Yes, friend I)., the sides of the new wax- 

 extractor are rabbeted out ]4 inch deep. The 

 rim for holding the glass is 13s inches deep, leav- 

 ing a projection of }4 i'leh to get hold of. above 

 the sides or ends of the box. Perhaps I do not 

 quite understand, but I think the cover can be 

 slid back in the .same way that you speak of, 

 so as to leave a,n opening as large or as snuill as 

 may be desired for putting in bits of wax. We 

 tried to make it just as near like yours as pos- 



