34 HOW TO MAKE A COUNTRY PLACE 



Our Honey Bee Industry. 



The boys who, as we shall see later, built "The Cot," had a 

 strong liking for bees, snakes, turtles and all animal life. Under 

 the tutelage of an apiarist who lived near, a swarm of bees was cap- 

 tured from the branch of an apple tree and installed in a novel hive 

 made by removing the lower sash in one of the attic windows, 

 fitting a neatly-made box tightly in the space, and boring holes in 

 the window frame for ingress and egress of the bees. On the room 

 side of the box they inset a broad sheet of glass darkened by a 

 screen. Utilizing the plan of a friend, a sliding microscope was 

 arranged against the glass, so that on lifting the curtain the bees could 

 be microscopically seen in their home life. 



No more pathetic insect life exists than that of the female 

 bee, born a queen, but changed in a few days, through insufficient 

 food, to a worker in a realm of abject servitude. She knows no 

 rest, and after weeks of continuous toil there comes a morning, as 

 she darts from the hive to her daily task, when the worn out wings 

 fail, and she falls to the ground never to rise again. 



One of our queen bees by actual count in twenty-four hours 

 laid 2,000 eggs toward her life quota of from one and one-half to 

 two and one-half million. The busy bee, Napoleon's emblem, 

 led us deep into the mysteries of one phase of interesting insect life, 

 and twenty hives in one orchard kept our friends and us honeyed 

 all the year. 



The window bee-hive, where there was no risk of being stung, 

 was one of the farm sights, and interested all visitors, while the 

 incentive given the children to study natural history formed method- 

 ical habits of research, close observation and that greatest of all factors 

 in success concentration. 



Star Gazing. 



From bee-keeping and its kindred attractions, they were drawn 

 to the study of astronomy, and the five-inch lens telescope set up on 

 the old farm-lookout was in constant use. Star gazing in the open 

 was supplemented by indoor lessons. 



