October 2- 



1917. 



NATURE 



145 



in tiie treatment of wounds in the British Army, with 

 €ol. C. J. Bond, C.M.G., of Leicester, and it occurred 

 to both of us that, if an opportunity could be found, 

 it would be well worth while to experiment with acri- 

 flavine in connection with the Isle of Wight disease. 



On July 6 I obtained an apparently healthy swarm 

 of bees, which was at once successfully hived at the 

 Leicester Museum. On July ii numbers of the bees 

 were seen crawling on the grass in front of the hive, 

 and a batch had congregated on one of the legs. 

 Previous to this the bees had been noticed to be slow- 

 in taking wing from the alighting board and to have 

 a distended look. On July i6 I had a visit from Mr. 

 S. Jordan, of 25 Longfield Road, Bristol, a well-known 

 bee expert of many years' standing. We went to the 

 hive and carefully examined the stock, and Mr. Jordan 

 expressed his conviction that the bees were suffering 

 from Isle of Wight disease, pointing to the " crawlers," 

 the brown excrement which he squeezed from their 

 distended bodies, and the dislocated wings of many 

 as symptoms confirmatory of an opinion based on a 

 lifetime's experience. Having already obtained some 

 acriflavine, through Col. C. J. Bond,'from Dr. C. H. 

 Browning, director of the Bland-Sutton Institute of 

 Pathology, Middlesex Hospital, W., I at once placed 

 a feeder on the top of the brood box, containing a 

 pound of honey to which had been added forty cubic 

 centimetres of a solution of acriflavine (strength i in 

 1000, i.e. one gram of acriflavine to a thousand cubic 

 centimetres of water). In addition to this, I sprayed 

 the bees, over the top of the frames, with a quantity 

 |of> the acriflavine solution (i in 1000) until most of 

 [the bees were distinctly wet. The next day the bees 

 [appeared much livelier and more alert than at any 

 ■time since their arrival, but during the subsequent 

 I week crawlers ap>peared from time to time. They 

 Iwere, however, much more active than those previously 

 [seen, and were generally engaged in vigorously work- 

 ling their abdomens and rubbing their sides vi'ith their 

 [hind-legs. I was glad to notice that the bees were 

 [taking the acriflavine-honey down quite freely from 

 l^e feeder, which I continually replenishecl, and 

 idually the crawling symptoms disappeared. 

 On opening the hive in the latter part of August I 

 )und the colony much reduced in numbers, but look- 

 ig beautifully clean and healthy, with a quantity of 

 icriflavine-honey stored in the brood frames. This 

 ^as very obvious, owing to the greenish fluorescent 

 inge which acriflavine imparts to mixtures. There 

 ?ere no signs of crawling, but the small size of the 

 jlony led me to think that most of the crawlers had 

 robably not been cured but had died off, the infer- 

 ice being that the acriflavine had prevented the infec- 

 lon from spreading to the young bees which had 

 iken their place. I am inclined to think that if I 

 id mixed a little honey with the spraying solution 

 acriflavine I should have possibly saved the diseased 

 lembers of the hive, because they would have taken in 

 IB solution much more readily. This is a point calling 

 >r further trial. 



During the course of my experiments I tried feeding 

 le bees with a syrup made from cane-sugar, to which 

 Acriflavine solution (i in 1000) had been added, at the 

 ite of twenty cubic centimetres of solution to each 

 )ound of syrup. The bees, however, refused to take 

 this mixture, and I had to return to honey. Latterly, 

 since the advent of colder weather, the bees have 

 refused to take down even honey when acriflavine was 

 mixed with it to the above strength, and I am forced 

 to conclude that it is only during that part of the year 

 when they are fairly active that thev will take the 

 acriflavine from a feeder. This is confirmed by Mr. J. 

 Waterfield, of Kibworth, to whom I gave a supply of 

 acriflavine solution for the purpose of experiments 



NO. 2504, VOL. 100] 



upon his own bees. They, like mine, refused to take 

 down the solution, although supplied in honey. 



I have given out several supplies of acriflavine solu- 

 tion to beekeepers whose stocks have been attacked by 

 the disease, within the last three or four weeks, but 

 owing to the lateness of the season there have been no 

 visible effects to report, and although I consider my 

 own results distinctly encouraging, 1 should not have 

 ventured to mention acriflavine at this stage but for 

 Mr. Smith's advertisement. It now seems important 

 to have all possible information regarding it, and I 

 hope Mr. Smith will publish his experiences, which 

 would appear to be more extensive than mine. 



Turning to the question of the cause of the Isle of 

 Wight disease, I have been quite unable to detect any 

 trace of the Protozoan parasite Nosenia apis in any 

 of the diseased bees which I have examined. 1 have 

 submitted dozens from the infected hive at the museum 

 to a very careful microscopic examination, and have 

 also examined specimens from three other localities 

 in Leicestershire, all of them "'crawlers" from hives 

 showing all the ordinary symptoms of Isle of Wight 

 disease, without finding A", apis in a single case. I 

 am, therefore, at present in complete agreement with 

 Messrs. Anderson and Rennie, who state, in an impor- 

 tant paper in the Proceedings of the Royal Physical 

 Society of Edinburgh, 1915-16, vol. xx., part i, 

 pp. 16-61, that, after extensive observations and experi- 

 ments, they are "unable to recognise any causal rela- 

 tion between the presence of this parasite and the 

 disease." 



In all the specimens I have examined, bacteria were 

 abundant in the contents of the rectum, and it is 

 difficult to resist the impression that the trouble may 

 be due directly or indirectly to these organisms, 

 although the statement is niade by Dr. Maiden, in 

 the Board of Agriculture's second report on the Isle 

 of Wight disease, in July, 1913, that "investigations 

 have failed to reveal any species of bacteria constantly 

 associated with the symptoms of the Isle o7 Wight 

 disease." 



As a beginner in beekeeping and a new worker in 

 the field, I am impressed by the need for much further 

 investigation as to the cause and cure of this trouble- 

 some disease. I hope, however, that in v'lev^ of the 

 good results which have been claimed for bacterol, and 

 the possibilities presented by acriflavine, beekeepers 

 may take courage and face whatever risk mav be 

 involved in beekeeping, as a national dutv in these 

 days of sugar shortage. 



it should be mentioned that mv work is being car- 

 ried out under the auspices of the' Museum and Libra- 

 ries Committee of the Leicester Corporation, which has 

 provided me with every facility. On its behalf I 

 should be glad to supply, free of charge, sufficient acri- 

 flavine for a good trial to any beekeeper having the 

 disease among his stocks who "will apply to me at the 

 Leicester Museum, and undertake to send me an 

 account of the result. E. E. Lowe. 



The Museum. Leicester, October 16. 



Tidal Energy Dissipation. 



In regard to my estimate of viscous dissipation of 

 oceanic energy in its bearing on the slowing of the 

 earth's rotation (Proc. Roy. Soc, A, 93, p. 348), I quite 

 assent to Mr. JefTreys's position (Nature,' vol. xcix., 

 p. 405, July 19, 19 17) that it is still open to doubt 

 whether the viscosity of the ocean causes a very appre- 

 ciable part of the earth's retardation. The formula 

 for calculating the rate of dissipation of internal energy 

 by viscosity, in the absence of disturbing forces, from 

 a knowledge of the surface currents alone, is not 

 challenged. But, irrespective of his argument, this 



