1880 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



205 



second was a postal, whereon it was stated that a 

 certain person had sent me 50c. in stamps for LOO en- 

 velopes, and he supposed I had overlooked his order, 

 as the same had not been received. Response No. 

 3. just received, is a postal claiming- that some one 

 had sent me money for 1H0 envelopes as per "ad." in 

 Gleanings, and wanted to hear from me by return 

 mail in reference therpfo. These three postals are 

 all I have to show for the money I paid you for in- 

 serting my advertisement. The trouble is, how am 

 I to know that any one really sent me money? If I 

 had received severaldozen letters containing- money, 

 in response to the advertisement, and among- them 

 these growling- postals, I might fill their orders any- 

 how. Now what ought I to do? This might again 

 be used as a proof of "man's inhumanity to man," 

 when a poor invalid like myself tries so hard to 

 make an honest living, and finds that his fellow men 

 reward him by trying to get him to fill orders that 

 he never received, or— what are we to think of it? 

 Vistula, Ind., Apr. 13, 1880. S. P. Yoder. 



It certainly is true, friend Y., that "an 

 enemy" has got in among us, and it be- 

 hooves us all to set to work earnestly to get 

 him out. The innocent have nothing to 

 fear, but the guilty may well shake in their 

 shoes. God's mighty arm is with us, and 

 the truth will come out, as it did in regard 

 to the mail robberies a year ago. We have 

 the names on a book, of all who have claimed 

 to have lost money, and yet refuse to reply 

 in regard to our requests for half price, after 

 we have sent them the goods. Now, will 

 dealers in supplies, and our brother editors, 

 give me the names of those who claim to 

 have sent them money, which was lost? or, 

 better still, send me their letters? for there 

 is a peculiar hand-writing (over different 

 signatures) coming from the post-offices of a 

 certain county, which begins to come out 

 pretty prominently. 



Now, boys, can we not let friend Y. know 

 that the readers of bee journals are by no 

 means all dishonest, even if his experience 

 has been a little discouraging? Will not at 

 least those who have so often omitted to sign 

 their names give him an order for envelopes, 

 and that, too, for more than a single one as 

 a sample? 



■*» ■!»»- 



A SHORT CHAPTER ON MICROSCOPES. 



ALSO SOME NEW DEVELOPMENTS IN RE- 

 GARD TO BEE STINGS. 



-TTy^IIEN a boy, and about as soon as I 

 W'y/ was old enough to read anything 

 fflJ about the wonders of the unseen 

 world which microscopes were said to reveal, 

 I was almost crazy on the subject. I began 

 my first investigations with some of my 

 grandmother's spectacle lenses ; and when a 

 little older, I saved my pennies until I was 

 able to purchase a sun-glass. This, of 

 course, did not reveal very much, but when 

 I afterwards got a small magnifying glass 

 for about a half dollar, I was quite happy 

 with it for many days. It Avas not, however, 

 until I was old enough to teach school, that 

 I scraped together money enough to pur- 

 chase a real, compound, achromatic micro- 

 scope, and you may be sure that my pupils 

 received some lessons that winter not com- 



monly taught in country school houses, and, 

 as memory goes back, I can but feel that 

 they were the gainers, as well as myself. A 

 few years ago, a series of articles on astron- 

 omy appeared in our county paper, and the 

 writer pointed out to us the planets that 

 could be seen and recognized during the 

 year, with very cheap spy glasses and tele- 

 scopes. I finally made his acquaintance, 

 and was astonished to find that he was no 

 astronomer at all, but a common farmer who 

 had followed the starry heavens with a very 

 cheap, ordinary spy-glass, until he was com- 

 paratively at home and well acquainted 

 among the swinging worlds of the starry 

 deep. Well, in a year or two. I had done al- 

 most as much with my simple, cheap micro- 

 scope, as this friend had with his spy-glass. 

 My little microscope was the same thing 

 that we now sell for $3.00, and, although the 

 books all said that but little could lie done 

 with such an instrument, I managed by dint 

 of hard work, with bright, young eyes, to 

 see, or at least get a glimpse of, almost all 

 the important objects named in the books. 

 Those conversant with such instruments 

 have perhaps learned that a great many 

 things may be seen by close looking, that 

 were at first pronounced absolutely invisible. 



Years passed, and I became possessor of a 

 microscope worth 8 100.00 ; but I was then a 

 busy man, and had not the time to get real- 

 ly well acquainted with it, and, to tell the 

 truth, it never gave me half the pleasure or 

 instruction, which the first little instrument 

 I have mentioned gave me. I sold it, and, 

 for years, the hobby of my boyhood was laid 

 aside, and partially forgotten. In due time, 

 the little flaxen-haired "new edition" of A. 

 I. Boot, as he grew toward manhood, began 

 to manifest a great curiosity about, and fan- 

 cy for, his papa's old playthings that were 

 safely stowed away on a high shelf, away up 

 stairs. The electrical machine was pulled 

 down, the dust wiped off, the same old books 

 opened, and even if some of them did get 

 broken and left around, he was never satis- 

 lied until he had made each and every one of 

 these things "go," and seen just how they 

 "worked." By and by, he got around to the 

 microscope. If I am correct, I fretted some, 

 remarking it would be something else the 

 next week, and that he would never stick to 

 any one thing. His mother remarked half 

 apologetically, that he wanted to know all 

 about all these things, just as I did once, 

 and, to tell the truth, I had not very much 

 reason to complain for we both remembered 

 well the time when her good father objected 

 to me, because I would never stick to any 

 one thing a week at a time. 



Well, to my surprise, the microscope was 

 not dropped. A cousin of his, Mr. Gray's 

 boy, took the fever for microscopes at about 

 the same time, and they were together day 

 and night, lugging their instruments back 

 and forth, scraping the bottom of ponds and 

 puddles for specimens, spilling acid on the 

 tables and carpets, spoiling the grindstones 

 in grinding glasses on which to mount speci- 

 mens, and leaving traces of their work all 

 about every where, until at least one of their 

 mothers began to fear they were wasting val- 

 uable time, in their devotion to their pet sci- 



