854 



GLeANIMGS m fiEE CULTURE. 



Dec. 



of the schemes undertaken by those who give their 

 time and energies to party politics. Best of all, 

 Mr. Jones has recently enrolled himself as a sub- 

 ject of that kingdom which is "not of this world; " 

 atid devoting- his great abilities and wonderful en- 

 ergy to the promotion of its beneflcent purposes, 

 he may, if he will, verify the motto of his bee- 

 journal, "the greatest possible good to the great- 

 est possible number," in ways that will make him 

 a blessing to generations yet unborn. " So mote it 

 be ! " Wm. F. Clarke. 



C4uelph, Ont., Can., Nov. 10, 1887. 



Friend Clarke, your excellent sketch is in- 

 tensely interesting to myself, if not to our 

 readers, especially where it takes tip the 

 time when friend Jones began to scrape ac- 

 quaintance with the bee-journals and bee- 

 keepers of the United States. His inventive 

 turn of mind was shown in his automatic 

 swarmer, pictured in a diagram back in 1875. 

 About that time we used to get quite a few 

 communications from Mr. Jones; but pretty 

 soon he became so full of railroads, stores, 

 large apiaries, and foreign travel, that we 

 had to content ourselves with getting re- 

 ports of him from his neighbors, or whoever 

 took a notion to send us items. After his 

 visit here we knew him a great deal better ; 

 and one needs to know friend Jones to un- 

 derstand him. Truly is our friend a " versa- 

 tile and many-sided man," as you say ; and 

 until one gets thoroughly acquainted with 

 him, he might find a good many things to 

 pick at and find fault with. He not only 

 takes sudden starts in new directions, but 

 he often apparently forgets what he has said 

 the day before or the year before, and in a 

 reckless sort of way makes off-hand state- 

 ments. None but his intimate friends really 

 know how good a man he is at heart, and 

 how sincerely he is devoted to the best in- 

 terests of the great world at large. If he 

 for the time neglects single individuals, you 

 may be pretty sure it is because the good of 

 great multitudes demands that he should 

 for the time ignore things that are in truth 

 only trifles compared to the thing his heart 

 and soul are absorbed in. When his work 

 on this earth is done, it may be truly said of 

 him, " He loved his fellow-man." 



MR. COW^AN. 



THE GENTRY OF ENGLAND. 



/S^EAR UNCLE AMOS:— You remind me of a 

 fKi ol greater Amos, who said he was " no prophet, 

 11^ nor the son of a prophet, but a herdman, and 

 ^^ a gatherer of wild flgs (see margin); and the 

 Lord took him as he followed the flock, and 

 said unto him. Go prophesy." I do not mean to tell 

 you that you foretell future events, but take rather 

 the New-Testament idea of a prophet; i. e., a teach- 

 er, fori must say I do think God has sent you to 

 teach. 



Well, I want to tell you I like Gleanings; first, 

 because I am a bee-keeper; but more than all, be- 

 cause you are neither afraid nor ashamed to carry 

 Christ— I will not say religion— into all your daily 

 employments. To attempt to do this for the sake 

 of temporal gain, or to increase your credit for hon- 

 est dealing, is, to my mind, the worst of all hypocri- 



sy; but to do so to glorify our Master and Lord is 

 what, above all things, this busy world requires at 

 the present day. 



You will say, " Who and what are you to talk to 

 me in this fashion?" I am many years your junior; 

 but that you may judge how far I can appreciate 

 you sentiments 1 will tell you that I never smoked, 

 nor drank intoxicants in my life. I have endeavor- 

 ed to serve Christ for 30 years; and during all that 

 time I have taken a lively interest in Sunday-school 

 work, and have many times stood at street-corners 

 preaching to those who would not come into a 

 building to listen. That is all I want to tell you 

 about myself, as I sat down to write about the visit 

 of our Mr. Cowan to Canada and the States. I am 

 glad he has been, and so are all British bee-keepers. 

 You know us better for having seen him, and we 

 know you all the better because of what he has told 

 us about you all. 1 have read what you and the 

 other bee-keepers have to say about him, and I con- 

 fess it has amused me a little. Fancy him coming 

 home to us dubbed as a doctor or professor! I am 

 almost sorry he did not accept the honor (?), as the 

 joke would have been almost too good. Then you 

 are all agreed that he is modest. We consider him 

 a good specimen of a dignified English gentleman. 

 It is not necessary to bounce, brag, or go about 

 with an undue amount of self-assertion If you have 

 knowledge, as you are certain to be recognized if 

 you go on your way and "let your light shine!" 

 Mr. Cowan is no exception. Then, again, as to 

 wealth, we do not measure it by the amount of 

 " dash " people cut. A countess just drove by, the 

 wife of one of the greatest lords in England. She 

 is a fine woman, with the dignity of an empress, 

 but her pony and chaise is not half so dashing as 

 some upstarts with i;500 per annum salary. Mr. 

 Cowan is a country gentleman. He has a nice little 

 mansion down an Horsham, in Sussex; he is com- 

 pelled to live in Switzerland, for Mrs. Cowan's 

 health; but the people who live on his farms, cot- 

 tages, gardens, smithy, etc., have not forgotten the 

 kindly relationt-hips that always existed between 

 him and them when he lived in their midst. Do you 

 know how a country gentleman lives in England, 

 and how he gets his income year by year? Perhaps 

 some of your readers do not, so you will spare me 

 room to tell them. 



In the first place, they have sufficient money to 

 be able to live on the interest, and they, as a rule, 

 do not seek to increase the capital. They own a 

 certain amount of land, more or less. On it there 

 will be a mansion surrounded with a i)ark; that 

 next the house is laid out as a pleasure-ground and 

 flower-garden, and is planted with shrubs and ever- 

 greens from all climates. The parks are studded 

 with grand old trees that no money would induce 

 them to fell. I saw a tree the other day blown up 

 by a gale. It was in a nobleman's park. It was 

 worth about £4 as timber; but the owner would 

 have given £500 to have been able to put it back 

 as an ornament. Outside the parks are the farms, ' 

 cottages, gardens, villages, etc. As a rule, the rent- 

 roll of these places produces from 2 to 4 per cent 

 per annum only, seldom more; consequently land 

 is more or less a luxury. A certain part of a gen- 

 tleman's capital would be in the public funds, and 

 brings in only ;5 or 'i\i per cent; the remainder 

 would be in rails, trains, water and gas, mines, tele- 

 graphs, home and foreign, and so they get a certain 

 income; as, if one thing fails, the others do not, 



