THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW, 



13 



lasts only forty to sixty days, all told: nd 

 the balance of the year our bees depend on 

 old stores for their living. 1 know that in 

 the past two years bees never made a living 

 before June ir)th, nor after Sept. 1st. An 

 apiary of ten-frame Simplicity hives won't 

 average stores enough to last from honey to 

 iiouey again. With a ten-frame hive one is 

 not safe without about ten pounds extra per 

 colony of reserve honey in the honey house ; 

 so where would your little eight-frame ban- 

 ties be ? 



Now, friends, I have done what I could to 

 make plain this " alifalfa " question. To any 

 who anticipate locating in the West, I will 

 give a word of advice : 



Remember, that the West is a big country. 

 That much of it is new. That the climate, 

 soil, altitude and adaptability to various 

 crops, etc., is very diversified. That princi- 

 pal business centers are farther apart than 

 in the East. Railway rates are higher, espe- 

 cially in the mountains. Doii''t forget that 

 the West is " boomed " for all it is worth, 

 and often more. For those who like it, it is 

 a good place to live, and there is much room 

 for development ; but, if you are fairly well 

 situated, don't pull up stakes and go West 

 just to raise honey in the alfalfa fields. 

 First go and see what you are going to, and 

 know whether you want to change or not. 

 The West has advantages over the East, ditto 

 the East over the West, l^erhaps it is six 

 of one and half a dozen the other, Vjut the 

 one is altogether different from the other. 

 Again I say, know where you will alight 

 before you jump. 



LovELAND, Colorado, Nov. 20, 1891. 



Feiend H.— This is quite a long article. 

 I did not know whether you wanted the " re- 

 view'' more in detail or not. I have con- 

 densed it as much as I thought I could to do 

 it justice. Perhaps you wished more said 

 about the honey part and less about the al- 

 falfa in general. 



The " tenderfoot " knows so little about 

 the W'est, and so many are taken in by 

 " boom papers " and "boom articles" that 

 I have tried to show it up as near the truth 

 as possible. 



Coe made a mistake when he came here 

 from New York. Not so much because he 

 came to the "alfalfa region," but because 

 he had no conception of the conditions. He 

 said he had no idea the flow was so ^arp 

 and short. 



R. C. A. 



Writing for Pay.— Hints to Poor Penmen.— 



What to Write About.— Avoid 



Personalities. 



ERNEST E. BOOT. 



OMMENCE with your subject matter 

 at once. Don't attempt to waste your 

 time, nor that of your reader, by 

 making a "suitable apology" for writing. 

 A preface does very well for a book ; but for 

 a magazine or journal it is rarely in place. 

 I have in mind one old writer on bees who 

 always mars his communications by hitching 

 on a sort of excuse. 



Don't write for pay or apicultural promi- 

 nence. You will rarely attain unto either if 

 you do. The one who writes because he has 

 something to tell, and not because he has 

 the "almighty dollar" in sight, will prob- 

 ably get the dollars and perhaps a little 

 glory thrown in. I am one who believes that 

 good articles should receive remuneration ; 

 l)ut "ye editor" must be the judge as to the 

 amount of value in the article. Young 

 writers should not be discouraged if no pay 

 is forthcoming for the first few maiden ef- 

 forts. It is usually the case that the pay 

 doesn't come until the writer has carved out 

 for himself some reputation. 



Most of us would be satisfied if we could 

 only see our communications in print, with- 

 out the almighty dollar. Perhaps a few 

 suggestions here may not come amiss. 

 Other things being equal, a tired, overworked 

 editor, as many of them are, prefer legible 

 and clean manuscripts, written on one side 

 of the paper, and without interlineations or 

 erasures. Among e(iually good articles as 

 to subject matter, these are the ones he will 

 select, provided he has a surplus of matter 

 on hand; but clean, "good copy," as the 

 printers call it, with no other merit, finds 

 insertion in the proverbial waste-basket. 



"But," says one, "I have something to 

 tell, but I write horribly ; and, besides, I 

 don't know how to spell, nor how to divide 

 my sentences." 



I'll tell you. Get your wife or one of your 

 children to copy off your scribblings, and 

 see how quick the editor will print it, ■pro- 

 viding you do have something to tell. I 

 know one writer for one of the secular papers 

 whose manuscripts were once rejected. He 

 thought he knew the reason, and finally had 

 his better half copy off, in good, plain hand, 

 his communications. Ever after that he had 

 no trouble about getting his letters into 



