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GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



J AX. 



Hock of grown-up Pekin ducks, with their 

 yellow bills and snow-white feathers, are, 

 as they swim about in their beautiful pond, 

 about the prettiest I ever saw in my life. 



Dec. :.— Once more I am seated out in the 

 morning sun, writing. I am on the edge of 

 a granite rock, almost on the summit of a 

 great mountain. After I got off the train 

 over a week ago, where the lady asked me if 

 I had visited Riverside, the following letter 

 was handed me: 



Mr, Root: If you can make it convenient to visit 

 Kiverside (and you will miss a great deal if you 

 don't— of course you must see Riverside), if you will 

 drop me a line I will meet you with a team and 

 show you around. I am not proud of my apiary, 

 but I can show you some things that you will be 

 pleased to see. I can take you up on one of those 

 " real live mountains. - ' As I live nearly on the top 

 of one, you can have a chance to climb to your 

 heart's content, or you can go horseback after we 

 get as far as we can go by wagon. 1 will esteem it 

 a special favor to have you call upon me, and I 

 think we should both be benefited. I can show you 

 the home of the orange, etc. I can show you bees 

 in hives, in houses, in barns, and in the rocks, where 

 you can go and get out honey, and bees without let 

 or hindrance, and I will go and help you. I can 

 show you orange-orchards that net the owners one 

 thousand dollars a year profit, per acre. I have 

 some land that brought me in at the rate of ten 

 thousand dollars a year per acre. It was in orange- 

 plants. Come and see me. J. W. Keeney. 



Riverside, Cal., Nov. 26, 1888. 



Well, here I am. Right in plain sight in 

 the valley below are seven different towns, 

 or villages: Riverside, East Riverside, Col- 

 ton, San Bernardino, Ontario, South River- 

 side, and Pomona. We have been out 

 havingaramble over the mountains. Friend 

 Keeney's hobby is finding springs of water 

 among the mountains. He always thanks 

 (iod for whatever he finds, and of course he 

 finds a great many of " God's gifts.' 1 He 

 has found nearly a dozen different springs 

 already, and therefore pure spring water 

 Hows in pipes almost all over the 160 acres 

 of mountain-top he has taken up. It is up 

 in the mountain-top where nobody else 

 would go, that he made $1000 raising orange- 

 trees on one-tenth of an acre. His six-year- 

 old prattler, Vernon, when asked if he liked 

 to live up on the mountain, replied, " Yes, I 

 like to live anywhere.' 1 '' Dear friend, can you 

 say as much as this little child of the moun- 

 tains V The other little prattler, that is 

 watching me while 1 write, is named Mig- 

 non, and she is only four years old, and 

 these two have a little nursery of orange- 

 trees, all their own. to water and care for. 



I not only climbed the mountain, but I sat 

 on the peak, even though said peak was 

 granite, and so sharp I feared it would 

 punch a hole in my trousers. If it did, I 

 proposed to present the rent to my wife as a 

 souvenir of the occasion. Two things con- 

 tributed to make my seat comfortable in 

 spite of its angular point. First, I was very 

 tired, and panting for breath; second, the 

 view was wonderful. Friend Keeney's 

 house, where I am now writing, seemed but 

 very little higher than the valley ; but as I 

 now turn and look back at the peak where I 



sat, it seems only a very little higher, as the 

 height of mountains is so deceptive to the 

 eye. The buggy is now waiting for me, and 

 we must go. By the way, perhaps you think 

 it funny the good people out here have noth- 

 ing to do but to hitch up and drive me 

 around, and wait on me. Well, I have 

 thought so too, a great many times, and I 

 am going to try to pay them back if I can. 



A CALIFORNIA BEE-CAVE. 



Half way down the mountain, friend K. 

 handed the lines to his wife, hopped out of 

 the buggy, told me to come on, and, oh my ! 

 didn't he dodge about among the rocks and 

 bushes, along the mountain-side V If some 

 old bear should take a notion to catch him, 

 he would roll over sure, for that is what I al- 

 most did, several times. Pretty soon he 

 came to a bee-cave in the rocks, and showed 

 me where they had been getting pieces of 

 honey out as they wanted it, for years. Yes, 

 and the neighbors did the same ; but the 

 beesalwajs fixed it up very patiently, and 

 put in more. Well, he smoked them a little, 

 and we too took out a great slice to eat with 

 our lunch when dinner time came. A week 

 ago he took SO lbs. of honey from one of 

 these clefts in the recks, and he is going to 

 save the bees besides. There are great 

 quantities of bees and honey in the rocks, 

 much of it inaccessible without expensive 

 blasting. One man, near Los Angeles, lost 

 his life by falling while trying to get the 

 honey from a bee-cave. It was in a bad 

 place to get at, and the bees stung him so 

 badly that he lost his footing. 



('. O. PERRINE. 



Dec. 7, evening.— Friend Keeney was right 

 about Riverside, and I am very glad he in- 

 vited me here. It is a town of about 5000 

 inhabitants, three weekly papers, two dai- 

 lies, and no saloons. They first raised the 

 tax to $500 for three months, and for a while 

 no saloon-keeper dared undertake it with 

 such odds against him. Finally one opened, 

 and charged 15 cts. a drink. At the end of 

 the quarter he announced his determination 

 of trying it another three months. At this 

 crisis the Riverside people arose in their 

 might and decided no saloon should ever 

 more disgrace their beautiful corporation 

 limits at any price ; and to show that they 

 were in earnest they enlarged their limits, 

 in one direction at least, as far as ten miles. 

 We drove out this ten miles on what is call- 

 ed Magnolia Avenue. There are miles and 

 miles of beautifully laden orange-trees, with 

 the limbs propped to keep them from break- 

 ing ; along the roadsides are the most beau- 

 tiful palm-trees, and almost every other 

 kind of ornamental shade-tree that this 

 world produces. I doubt if there are on the 

 whole face of the earth any more beautiful 

 residences than these. We drove into one 

 of the prettiest orange-groves to eat our 

 lunch ; and when friend Keeney introduced 

 the proprietor, he too "knew A. I. Root.'' 

 Dear reader, who do you suppose it was ? 

 Why, Mr. C. O. Perrine, the man who wast- 

 ed his money on the steamboat apiary, as 

 mentioned in the A B C book. Friend P. 

 bought land here about six years ago, and 

 has, as he says, taken advantage of the 

 boom, and got back the money that went 



