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EDITOR. 



Voinv. Jan. 19, 18 



No, 3, 



Editorml Bueeimqs, 



l>r. C. v.. Sliller has just returned 

 from Colorada, whither he went to attend 

 the funeral of a brother-in-law. Death 

 seems to have been quite busy in the Doc- 

 tor's family lately. We are glad to know 

 that he has returned in safety. 



Mr. J. Y. I>et-»vilcr has returned to 

 New Smyrna, Fla., and on New Year's Day 

 he gatliered a bouquet of sweet-scented 

 flowers, and sent them to this office— for 

 which he has our thanks. 



Hon. R. K>.Xay lor, a well-known api- 

 arist of Michigan, has been elected to the 

 State Senate. That body has gained in him 

 another able, conscientious and practical 

 member— one that will be an honor to it and 

 to the State. 



Xlie Weatlicr, says Prof. Cook, in a 

 letter, on .Jan. 5, is "delightful for winter- 

 regular Spring weather." And so it is in 

 Illinois as well as Michigan. In fact both 

 Europe and America report the same mild 

 winter weather. We do not remember the 

 like as far as our memory can reach. The 

 bees have sported in the sun almost daily. 



»* I^an^Mlrotli on the Hive and Honey- 

 Bee, revised, enlarged and completed by 

 Clias. Dadant & Son," is the title of a new 

 book just placed upon our desk by the pub- 

 lishers. It contains 535 pages, 16 full page 

 plates, and 197 illustrations. It is excel- 

 lently printed on good paper, and substan- 

 tially bound in cloth. 



As the matter for the Bee Journal was 

 all prepared before it came, we must defer 

 a review until our next issue. 



The price is $2.00, and it may be obtained 

 at this office. 



Xlie Election of officers for the Na- 

 tional Bee-Keepers' Union, just held, re- 

 sulted in the re-election of the old Board, as 

 will be seen by the following, which gives 

 the vote in detail : 



For President.— James Heddon 95, G. 

 M. Doolittle 6, Dr. C. C. Miller .5, Prof. A. 

 J. Cook 3, A. I. Koot 2, Single Votes 6, 

 Blank 8. 



For Vice Presidents.— Prof. A. J.Cook 

 108, A. 1. Root, 10(i, Dr. C. C. Miller, 105, G. 

 W. Demaree, 105, G. M. Doolittle 104, James 

 Heddon 11, Ch. Dadant 9, Eugene Secor 5, 

 Scattering 22, Blank 10. 



For General Manager, Secretary 

 AND Treasurer.- Thomas G. Newman 

 114, G. M. Doolittle 1, Blank 10. 



While the General Manager has no desire 

 to continue in office and would welcome a 

 successor, it is very flattering to notice that 

 he received every vote but one, and that 

 ballot recorded a vote for him for President 

 instead, and of necessity required another 

 name for Manager. 



Now, will the coming year be simply a 

 repetition of former years ? Or, will thou- 

 sands of bee-keepers flock to the standard 

 and unite with their brothers in defense of 

 the pursuit of apiculture ? 



Kobinson, the one whose ' abuse of 

 Father Langstroth was noticed in an edi- 

 torial on page 835 of last year, has raised 

 the ire of our friend Henry Alley, of the 

 Apiculturist, who writes us as follows : 



I read your remarks and comments re- 

 garding the abuse of Mr. Langstroth by C. 

 J. Robinson, in an "Eastern publication." 

 As there are no less than three Enstem bee- 

 publications, would it not have been better 

 to have named the particular paper to whicli 

 your remarks have reference ? Whv leave 

 your readers to guess which of the Eastern 

 "bee-publications" would stoop so low as 

 speak otherwise than respectfully of one 

 held in such high esteem by all good men as 

 is Mr. Langstroth ? Have the courage. 

 Brother Newman, to speak out in meeting. 

 Hurl your remarks (the justice of which we 

 all acknowledge) direct at the editor who 

 admitted to his paper such an article as you 

 mention, concerning a man so honest and 

 pure as our friend Langstroth. The paper 

 to which you allude has not been received 

 at our office. If one comes to hand we shall 

 not hesitate to mention the name of it. 



A few years since, this same Robinson 

 tried his luck in getting some goods here on 

 the plea that he would give us a " puff " in 

 some of the bee-papers. Just at that time 

 our goods needed no special " puff," as we 

 had more orders than we could fill. Never- 

 theless we got the "puff" just the same. 

 But the free advertising given us was not 

 calculated or intended to increase the sale 

 ofourgoods. But it really did help us, as 

 hundreds of bee-keepers well knew that the 

 author was only venting Jhis spleen at our 

 (supposed) expense. 



Oh, yes, Bro. Alley ! We omitted the 

 name simply to avoid any feeling, hoping 

 that the editor would apologize for the mat- 

 ter—and not because we had not the cour- 

 age to particularize. Now that the name is 

 called for, we will say that the article ap- 

 peared in the Bee-Keepers^ Magazine for 

 November, 1888, page 325. Such attacks 

 cannot injure the reputation of Father 

 Langstroth— but they are contemptably 

 mean, all the same. 



IIe«'s an<l Urapcs. — It has been 

 proven over and over again that bees do not 

 puncture sound grapes in order to obtain 

 the juice. It is true that they have often 

 been seen to suck up the juice from such 

 fruit as they find the skin already broken, 

 and uninformed or unthinking persons then 

 jump to to the conclusion that the bees do 

 injure sound grapes. A correspondent in 

 the Fruit Oruwers' Journal gives the fol- 

 lowing as the result of investigations made 

 through a microscope, of the bee's tongue : 



Dr. James McBride and I have just 

 turned away from the study of the bee's 

 tongue through the microscope, perfectly 

 satisfied that the bee cannot penetrate the 

 outer skin, or even the second skin of the 

 grape. This is also the decision of the 

 leading entomologists, and the scientists of 

 the government have so decided. It would 

 be precisely as if a painter should try to 

 bore a hole through an inch plank with an 

 ordinary paint brush, for the point of a 

 bee's tongue is a microscopic brush, which, 

 if pressed on the outer skin, would spread 

 out like the brush of a painter, and refuse 

 the desired entrance. But when the grapes 

 here and there are pierced by other insects 

 or birds, and most of the juice is left to rot 

 in juxtaposition to the sound and unbroken 

 grapes, the contagious rot would go on from 

 urape to grape until the whole bunch would 

 be ruined, were it not for the useful bee, 

 which immediately plunges its brushy 

 tongue into each orifice and extracts the 

 veasiy must from the broken hull, and dries 

 up in a short part of a day all the offending 

 matter, and as a scavenger, saves the fruit 

 from inevitable destruction. The bee is too 

 smart to plunge its sting into a grape, and 

 it is only to save or prolong lite that it 

 stings a mortal. 



Proliibitory Tax — The British Bee 

 Journnl toT Bee. 20, quotes the following 

 item from the "St. James' Gazette:" 



So extensive has the adulteration of honey 

 with glucose become in America, that ef- 

 forts are being made to obtain Federal leg- 

 islation, after the pattern of the oleomar- 

 garine law, to prevent it, by levying a pro- 

 hibitory tax on spurious honey. No doubt 

 the demand for American honev in foreign 

 countries has been greatly diniinished by 

 the sophisticated character of the stuff ex- 

 ported in recent years, which is more like 

 refined molasses than the delicate produce 

 of the bee. 



It then adds: "We congratulate our 

 Transatlantic brethren on this step in ad- 

 vance, and sincerely hope that success may 

 attend their efforts. 



"Oh, thanks awfully," Brother Cowar, 

 butthereis no truth in the item from the 

 Odzette I The adulteration of honey with 

 glucose is a thing of the past. The price of 

 liquid honey is so low that it would not pay. 

 We say most emphatically that no steps have 

 been taken "to obtain Federal legislation 

 after the pattern of the oleomargarine law " 

 or any other pattern, "to prevent it, by levy- 

 ing prohibitory tax on the spuriousiarticle .'■' 

 Such a tax would avail nothing— it does 

 not prevent the manufacture or sale of oleo- 

 margarine ; that is made in greater quauti- 

 ties to-day than ever before. 



Our Britisli cotemporary creates a false 

 impresMon, and it would be only just to 

 Americans for it to correct the same, or 

 else copy our most emphatic contradiction 

 of the assertions of the St. James' Gazette. 



