l88o 



GLEANINGS In B£E CULTURE. 



349 



horse in working in the ground. Why would 

 not a good-sized tile answer the same pur- 

 pose V AV ater flows on our low land through 

 the tile almost all the time, more or less. 

 Last fall 1 visited a celery farm where they 

 put tile just the deptli they wished the water 

 to come, and it did the husiness heautifully. 

 We shall be glad to know something more 

 about the flooding, my young friend. And 

 we should also like to know liow your father 

 made it pay. Is he raising cranberries yet V 



he Avas about, and he Went ofl looking kind 

 o' slieepish. I think I shall have to put 

 that little verse up somewhere along the di- 

 vision fence— that one that commences. — 



" Let dogs delifrht to bark and bite." 



You know the rest of it. I can not tell 

 you to-day bow the house is fixed, but may 

 be I will have our engraver give you a pic- 

 ture of it. It has two porches — oiie on the 

 east and one on the west side. The fowls 

 spend most of their time in the porches. 



FREDDIE'S 100 CHICKENS AND 60 EGGS A DAY, ETC. 



Our bees wintered verj- well. We had 26 hives, 

 and lost only one. In one hive the queen was not 

 good, and we killed her. We are getting 60 eggs a 

 day. We have 9 geese and 100 chickens. 



Fred W. Israel. 



Damascus, Col. Co., O., May 4, 1885. 



'.pi 



Every boj' or girl, under 15 

 *"■ years of age, who writes a 



letter for this department, containing 



SOME VALUABLE FACT, NOT GENERALLY 

 ON BEES OR OTHER MATTEHS, 



will receive one of David Cook's excel- 

 lent five- cent Sunday-school books. 

 Many of these books contain the same mat- 

 ter that you tlnd in Sunday-school books 

 costing from 81.00 to 81.50. If you have had 

 or more books, give ub the names that we 

 may not send the same twice. We have now 

 in stock six different books, as follows; viz.: 

 Sheer Off, The Giant - Killer. _ The Roby 



A LETTER FROM A MOTHERLESS LITTLE GIRL. 



My mother died last October. I have one brother 



and one sister. Pa had •13 swarms of bees iu the 



I fall; 4 swarms died tliis winter. 1 have one swarm. 



I When our bees get to robbing, pa exchanges hives 



and they go in their own. Pa sent to the I'. S. Fish 



Commissioner for some German carp. 



Constantinc, Mich. Edna Kifenbeisgh, age 11. 



Our Homes, Part II. Besides the above books, you may have u 

 photograph of our ulil hduse npiar\'. taken a (freat many veai-s 



a^'o. Initisa |.i. iiii ,n >.lt. lilur Kn.s.uikI Caddy. anda 



i;rimp.se of Kin. i w ■ hi^ :il>.. -om. i.nttv little colored 

 pictures of bird-, iimi . il.^^.i-, .1. . -uiiihle for framing. 



Vou can have >..ui .1 ..i aii.\ ..n,- .,i i in- above picturis 



or books for ever> Ictlei Uial t'ivct. u.> suuie valuable piece of 

 information. 



' .V chiefs amang ye takin' notes; 

 An' faith, he'll pi-ent it." 



fELlj, my little friends, if yon were to 

 come to see me tiiis bea'iitiful Mav 

 day. what do you think I would 

 have to show yoiiV I guess it would 

 be the new poultry yard and house, 

 r made the yard of two lolls of poultry-net- 

 tiug. and put Ihc house iu the middle. Tiien 

 I had it separated so I could have Plymouth 

 Uocks iu one end and Li^ht Ihahmas in the 

 other. The Light Ihahiuas I like the best, 

 as they are .so gentle, ami nice looking too; 

 and tiien they give iis such beautiful big 

 brown eggs every day. Iliiber and 1 gather 

 the eggs; and when they ;iie nice and clean 

 we have a real good time adniiiing each one 

 of the eggs. The Hralima rooster is almost 

 as tall as Iluber. and lluber c;iii put his arm 

 around the roosters neck, without scaring 

 him much either. A few days ago, when 

 the men were at work on the house they let 

 the two roosters get together, and. oh'my! 

 how they made the feathers lly. and blockl 

 too, some. I went and put my arms around 

 the Ih'ahma, and led him back home, and 

 then I began talking to iiini about the folly 

 of tightint;- when there was not anv thing to 

 light about at all. AVhat do you think he 

 didV Why, he turned around and bristled 

 up, and was going to flght me. I laughed 

 so hard tliat it probably reminded him what 



A SWAR.M OF BOYS, ETC. 



My papa keeps hecs. He delights very much in 

 them. We all like your A B C book and Glean- 

 ings. I like honey better than stings. I do not get 

 about the bees much. Mamma needs inc in the 

 house most of the time. I have no sister, but five 

 brothers, all younger than myself. Papa says if a 

 man wants to be suocossful in bee-keeping he also 

 needs a swarm of boys about him. 



Davidsburg, Pa. Cevill.v K. Emig, age 11. 



A letter FRO.M .V wee SCOTCH LASSIE. 



I am a wee Scotch lassie called Mina; went to 

 school last harvest with sister Gina, and I am going 

 often. Father is a great beekeeper, and won the 

 prize for the Highland essay. He takes his bees to 

 the Lead Hills every year for heather honey. He is 

 not well, and I lieli) him all I can. When I was 3 I 

 asked him if the wee liees iiad wee een to see in the 

 (lark— not the dark of the skep, but the dark when 

 I am slee|)ing. A bee-freen calls me Wee Bee ever 

 since; isn't that funny:' It will be far to send me a 

 book for this. Wili.hemina Smith Thomson. 



Auchinraith, Scotland. 



EHNE.ST'S r-AI'.\ AVITH HIS FOUR APIARIES. 



My pa has four yards of bees; 52 colonies in one 

 place, 40 in another, :30 in another, and 45 in anoth- 

 er; they are in cellars, except ,55, which are buried 

 under the snow. It has been 48 degrees below zero 

 here this winter, but the bees are doing well. Part 

 of the bees, pa is working on shares. He has 100 

 sheep. It is fun to see the little lambs skip and 

 play. Ma has 40 Plymouth Eocks that laid 248 cgg^ 

 in tlie month of February. Ernest A. Gill. 



Viola, Wis., March 14, 18S5. 



Tliank you, Ernest, for your report. We 

 know youi' pa, and have known for some 

 time that lie was a big bee-keeper. Two 

 hundred and forty-eight eggs in the month 

 of February would be not (piite nine eggs a 

 day; but 1 should say that was tiptop for 

 forty hens in February, away up in Wiscon- 

 sin. 



