American Bee JouRxNal. 



EDITED AND PUBLISHED BY SAMUEL WAGNER, WASHINGTON, D. C. 



Vol. IIL 



SEPTElMBEIft, ISOT'. 



No. 3, 



[Translated for the American Bee Journal.] 



Contributions to Bee Culture in Cottage 

 Hives. 



No. 1. 



While thus submitting the first of a brief series 

 of articles on this topic, I would candidlly ad- 

 monish my readers that I have no expectation 

 of being able to furnish them with anything 

 specially novel or striking. At the same time 

 I would request thcni to acquit me of the vanity 

 of conceiving that I am one of the shrewdest 

 among bee-keepers, and thus authorized to as- 

 sume the position of an instructer. On the 

 contrary, I verily believe there are many 

 practical bee keepers much shrewder, more 

 competent, and of larger experience than my- 

 self. I am content, in the hope of being useful, 

 to occupy an humbler rank. My desire is rather, 

 by these contributions, to induce others to com- 

 municate, for our common benefit, some de- 

 tailed s'atement of their views, experiences, 

 processes, and manipulations. For I appre- 

 hend that in these periodicals, bee-culture as it 

 has been, is, and must long continue to be 

 practiced with common hives among the com- 

 mon people, is equally entitled to investigation 

 and discussion, as the new method aided by 

 movable comb hives and the Dzierzon theory. 

 Even admitting that those who have for many 

 years used the common straw or box hive, have 

 long since become experts in practice, and have 

 attained to such advances in knowledge and ex- 

 perience, that nothing remains for them to learn 

 from one another— which is hardly a supposable 

 case — there are still among the readers of these 

 papers, a large number of new beginners, and 

 of practitioners of limited experience, to whom 

 it will be decided!}' advantageous to have many 

 matters described and discussed with minute- 

 ness and simplicity, which older apiariims may 

 regard as thoroughly settled and universally 

 known. Though the old jtractice of dealing in 

 secrets and mysteries has largely gone out of 

 vogue in bee-culture, as in other branches of 

 human handicraft, there are yet here and there 



some ancient bee-masters who withhold what 

 they know, and cannot bring themselves to find 

 their richest recompense in imparting freely to 

 others the acquisitions of their experience. 

 Hence beginners are ofttimes nonplussed in 

 their efforts and discouraged. They have 

 heard, as it were, the tinkling of the bell, but 

 cannot ascertain distinctly whence the sounds 

 proceed or what precisely they betoken. The 

 result is not unfreciuently perhaps, that because 

 of some slight mistake or inadvertence, the nov- 

 ice encounters disappointment and failure, in 

 an operation which properly conducted would 

 have been a gratifying success, cheering his 

 heart with delight and encouragement. 



The chief reason perhaps, why so few of the 

 bee-keepers of the country — though there are 

 among them many successful bee-masters — 

 write for the BtE Journals, is the fact, that 

 with rare exceptions, their education was lim- 

 ited to what was taught in our common schools 

 when they were young, and they are thus un- 

 practiced in the " art and mysterj'" of litertiry 

 composition Even some ol the more advanced 

 among them, well qualified to furnish instruc- 

 tive communications, dread, if they should 

 chance to express themselves awkwardly, being 

 laughed at and ridiculed as belonging to that 

 class of hopelul aspirants who are cursed with 

 the scribbling itch without being blessed with 

 the faculty of scratching themselves with a 

 good grace. 



But, worthy co-laborers in bee keeping, let us 

 not be deterred by such apprehensions from 

 contributing our mite for the advancement of 

 bee-culture. Rather let us compare those who 

 would look down so contemptously on our 

 humble efforts, to the butterfly in the fable, 

 which, arrayed in gay and gaudy colors, as it 

 fluttered among the flowers rtgarded with dis- 

 dain the busy inconspicuous bee that was so 

 assiduously !ipproi)riating the nectar. Yet the 

 bee could disi^lay in her lionie, works surpas- 

 sing the architect's skill aud treasures cl allen- 

 ging the miser's envy, while the gorgeous but- 

 terfly had not even a cranny it might claim as a 

 home. Thus let the true bee-keeper seek to 

 show his competency and skill by the flourish- 

 ing condition of his apiary, leaving sesquiped- 



