278 



August, 1914. 



American l^e Joarnal 



/ 



/ 





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r\ 



n 



CT 



//. 



B. 



The Slats Tacked On. 



may be turned as shown in illustration 

 C, thereby permitting the escape to be 

 taken o t. The slats serve to hold the 

 escape, tin or screen in place; they 

 should be Js-inch thinner than the out- 

 side rim, /. c. 3-l(i inch thick for the 

 common bee-escape board. The bee- 

 escape boards should, however, be fj- 

 inch deep with ?4-inch slats across the 

 center. 

 Rushford, Minn. 



the consciousness that sooner or later 

 this expanding bee business would call 

 loudly for a lift from his right arm. 



Before extracting time father burnt 

 up great areas of gray matter trying to 

 figure out a way to keep his vacation 

 from coinciding with that eventful and 

 dreaded occasion. Finally a neighbor 

 with strong arms and a somewhat inti- 

 mate acquaintance with the secrets of 

 Father Langstroth, was employed to 

 assist mother in taking the honey. So 

 while these two were immersed in the 

 mysteries and pleasures of Honeyland, 

 father was wading knee-deep in a cer- 

 tain trout stream. But even there 

 father's mind was notentirely at peace. 

 The " blue jinks " kept whispering to 

 him that sooner or later his day — his 

 Waterloo — with the bees would come. 

 And come it did, and that with a ven- 

 geance. 



On Sept. 1, father's job ceased, pe- 

 tered out, vamoosed. Not that he got 

 fired, but that the statute of limitation 

 was called upon that sort of work. 

 This left father upon the high seas of 

 idleness, which state was at once 

 pounced upon by mother as affording 

 the proper hiatus for father's initiation 

 into bee lore. (Right here, gentle 

 reader and frowning editor, let me 



Initiating Father 



BY W. EDGAR WOODRUFF. 



UP to this time mother had always 

 been the bee-man at our house. 

 Father's closest acquaintance with 

 the winged tribe consisted of clutter- 

 ing up good lumber in an effort to nail 

 "ready made" hives together, and in 

 sampling rather freely the liquid sweets 

 when they were placed upon the table. 

 Yes, and it must be confessed, that 

 father had been known to boast to our 

 neighbors of the fact that this "new 

 rig" or that new piece of furniture was 

 purchased with money that »tc made 

 out of <i//r bees. 



Mother had grown up in a bee-yard, 

 so to speak; had made her way through 

 college by means of them, and so noth- 

 ing was more natural than that she 

 should tend a few bees, 'that was all 

 very well so long as they could be kept 

 in our own bailiwick, but when mother 

 branched out and leased a large out- 

 yard the bee business began to take on 

 a serious aspect. At least it seemed so 

 to father, for it began to be hinted 

 around the table and in the secret 

 councils of the home that father might 

 now and then contrive to take a hand. 

 But father always managed to keep 

 both of his hands occupied with other 

 matters. The fact is, he made it a 

 point soon after this out-yard deal was 

 put through to secure a job that took 

 practically all of his waking hours. But 

 somehow, scheme as he might, there 

 would come sneaking into father's ken 



Escape Boaro According to George A. 



BOYUM. 



confess to you that the father in ques- 

 tion is yours truly. So, by your leave, 

 1 shall hereafter use the personal 

 pronoun.) 



I said my job ended on the 1st. It 

 was just one day later when my wife— 

 in a burst of confidence, like she was 

 disclosing some glad, good news— told 

 me that the late crop of honey was just 

 fairly groaning at the out-yard for 

 somebody to extract it. 



"Dad," said she with her sweetest 

 coo, "you and I are in for the finest 

 little outing of our lives. We will take 

 the small rig, a camp outfit, and you 

 may take your fishing tackle— what a 

 time we will have !" 



Whenever my wife wishes to take the 



sting out of a disagreeable thing she 

 promises me a day's fishing. However, 

 upon this occasion a deep blue " funk " 

 filled my horizon, and the silver hope 

 of a day with the finny tribe failed to 

 cause the clouds to lift. For, to tell 

 you the truth as between man and man, 

 I was mortally afraid of bees. One 

 was suflScient to set my nerves to buzz- 

 ing like a dentist's torture-machine, 

 while the thoughts of facing millions 

 of them — oh, what's the use? 



There came to my mind the memory 

 of that occasion when I proposed to 

 my wife, or rather, when I first at- 

 tempted to propose to her. For, as I 

 stated bLfore, her mother kept bees. 

 Yes, most decidedly she kept bees — 

 kept them in the garden, the backyard, 

 the front yard, and upon the front 

 porch. In fact, her bees acted as a 

 sort of barrier to keep the young men 

 away from her girls. But, as for me, I 

 was so infatuated that (at that stage of 

 the game) not even bees or yellow 

 jackets, for that matter, would prevent 

 me from dashing headlong where an- 

 gels were wont to tread. For, believe 

 me, those girls were some enticing ! 



When I proposed, or to speak more 

 accurately, when I was in the act of 

 proposing, the girl and I were out in 

 the garden where the bees were flying 

 thick and fast. She was plucking lilac 

 blossoms, and I was upon my knees 

 declaiming — 



" Doubt tliat the stars are fire. 

 Doubt truth to be a liar. 

 But never doubt my " 



Just then something happened — hap- 

 pened big, swift, effective. That last 

 word stuck in my throat. I grasped at 

 the seat of my— oh, it's none of your 

 business upon what particular part of 

 my anatomy that bee deposited its sting. 



But I wander from my story. Oh, 

 yes, I was saying my wife wanted me 

 to accompany her to the bee-yard. We 

 went; that is, my wife went. I sat in 

 the rig and supposedlj held the lines. 

 One thing only of that D-mile drive do 

 I remember. My wife stopped at the 

 post-office to get the mail. She re- 

 marked she had received a letter which 

 didn't interest me at ; 11. At any rate, 

 it didn't interest me then. I was trying 

 to pump mental vim into my despairing 

 soul in an effort to make myself believe 

 I was not afraid of bees. I, who, since 

 coming to the West, had poked a 

 mountain lion out of a den with a 

 pole ; I, who, had met a cinnamon bear 

 face to face and lived to tell the tale— I 

 simply would not be afraid of a mere 

 insect! While thus practicing my soul 

 we reached our goal, and before I re- 

 alized it, we were at work. 



"My! there won't be over five or six 

 hundred pounds of this crop," ex- 

 claimed my wife after she had hefted a 

 few supers. She proceeded to smoke 

 the bees out of a dozen or more supers 

 and I carried them into the honey 

 house. Everything was made ready, 

 and she showed me how to uncap the 

 combs of honey and place them in the 

 extractor baskets. She gave the ex- 

 tractor a few turns, reversed the bas- 

 kets, and then stopped to show me the 

 letter. It was a telegram and ran as 

 follows : 



"Be at the Capitol Tuesday morn- 

 ing. Fate of Woman Suffrage Bill 

 hangs on a full representation of our 



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