SHI'TKMUKR, 1919 



GLEANINGS IN 11 E L: C L L T U K E 



579 



ANNE LESTER AND DADDY LOWE, BEEKEEPERS 



By Grace Allen — Chapter VIII 



^^T->^EAK Brother Robert: I don't under- 



I J stand why my letters aren't reach- 

 ing you. Probably you '11 get them 

 all in a bunch. But lest you shouldn't, I'll 

 mention some things I've already told you. 



"Tlic most important is Jack Lowe's re- 

 turn — which you may know about. Anyway, 

 he 's here and has been for three weeks, 

 having arrived the third of September. And 

 now that the danger is past, I am going to 

 admit to you that for a time we were 

 frightfully worried over Mrs. Lowe. For 

 weeks she was so frail it seemed as tho any 

 unex2)eeted wave of the hand might carry 

 her off. And no news from Jack for so 

 long. Then out of that long silence sud- 

 denly came word of liis having been seri- 

 ously gassed. Why it had been so long get- 

 ting here will probably never be known. 

 How we dreaded telling her. But tho she 

 went even whiter than usual, she lay without 

 a word for a few minutes, there on the sofa; 

 then looked up at her husband with the 

 darlingest smile you ever saw, and said: 

 'Our baby. Father — a wounded soldier in 

 France!' — as tho the wonder of it lay 

 closer to her mother heart than the sadness 

 or the fear. Then she said it was good to 

 get past the uncertainties, asked for an egg- 

 lemonade and proceeded to get well! 



' ' Wires and letters came thick and fast 

 once they started, and almost before we 

 could comprehend the fact. Jack was here 

 himself. Not looking like himself, tho, be- 

 ing a very thin, white, shaky young man, 

 indeed, and greatly distressed over being so 

 soon out of the running. He was to be 

 made instructor at some camp over here, 

 but his strength is coming back so slowly, 

 that may be given up. Tho he still stub- 

 bornly plans to go back to France. 



"Mrs. Lowe's improvement has waxed 

 apace since his arrival. Of course he has 

 to lie around and rest most of the time, so 

 they are together a great deal. He is de- 

 voted to her. In fact, he seems as proud of 

 both of his parents as they are of him, and 

 he wants everyone else to be. I don't 

 blame him. But he has said so often that he 

 is glad I am fond of them both that it is 

 almost funny. How can I help l^eing fond 

 of them? 



"The whole neighborhood has wanted to 

 lionize him, but he 's as shy as a girl when 

 it comes to things like that. And anyway, 

 he isn't strong enough; so after the first few 

 days we have been pretty much alone here, 

 quiet and serene as always. Daddy Lowe is 

 his old self again — with his son back ap- 

 parently safe and his wife restored to some- 

 thing a little more substantial than the 

 mere shadow she was. He swings around 

 outdoors somewhat as he used to do, and 

 promptly resumed his interest in the bees. 



' ' ' We can make a honey display at the 

 Fair after all,' he told me after Jack had 

 been here a few days. He had previously 

 decided not to. We had to take what space 

 we could get, being the last ones to apply; 

 and then we rushed. It was all new to me. 

 I had never even been to a State Fair be- 

 fore. But Daddy Lowe has exhibited many 

 times, so he went at it like the veteran he is. 



"Last week was Fair week. All the hon- 

 ey exhibits were against a row of windows, 

 which certainly made the bottled honey 

 show up fine. Our booth was decorated in 

 red, white, and blue bunting. Everyone 

 else had the same thing, which was as it 

 should be. 



' ' It was fun, just lots of fun, watching 

 the people and listening to what they said. 

 I was often alone in the booth, knitting and 

 looking on and enjoying it all. They did 

 ask the most curious questions! And I 

 pointed out the queens in our glass-walled 

 nucleus boxes a hundred times. And ex- 

 plained about foundation and how to use the 

 extractor, and assured them the honey was 

 pure, and altogether had a picnic. Incident- 

 ally I sold some honey, and began to feel 

 remarkably experienced and wise. 



' ' I must tell you one story that a store- 

 keeper from a small country town told me. 

 Once he bought a whole barrel of honey 

 from a farmer beekeeper he knew, having 

 decided to try selling it like molasses. This 

 barrel had a spigot that turned sidewise. 

 Well, of course in a small country town the 

 grocery store is sort of headquarters; so one 

 day when a man sold a prize-winning Barred 

 Eock rooster, he arranged to deliver it to 

 the buyer at the grocery store. At the ap- 

 pointed time he arrived with his rooster and 

 waited around a bit. But the other nuui was 

 late. So he finally told the storekeeper he 'd 

 just leave the bird there if he didn 't mind. 

 'All right,' agreed the accommodating store- 

 man, ' just tie him up, back there some- 

 where. ' He tied him. And on that tying 

 hangs the tale. He tied him to the spigot 

 of the honey barrel. And the rooster flop- 

 ped and flapped and plunged, in his strug- 

 gle for liberty and self-government. Every- 

 one heard him using ungentlemanly rooster 

 language and doing his flopi^ing and flapping- 

 stunts. But everybody was busy, buying 

 or selling or fighting the war, so no one came 

 back to protest against either his opinions 

 or the unseemly vigor and violence of his 

 conduct. Yet according to later circum- 

 stantial evidence, the very first flop, dear 

 Brother, must have opened the spigot! The 

 honey had not only spread thick upon the 

 floor, but in its rush it had completely cover- 

 ed the rooster! He was honeyed from comb 

 to tail and on down his restless yellow legs. 



