mm 



THE AMERICAN BEE-KEEPER 



129 



don't know anything about it. There is 

 a jolly lot of truth there if you did but 

 know It. In Gleanings for May 1 that 

 Doctor of Straws says Mr. Pettit conies 

 down hard on thick-top bars (lucky 

 tiiey're thick). Then the amiable Doctor 

 and his understudy proceed to get each 

 other's ideas so beautifully mixed that 

 even their wives couldn't tell them what 

 they mean. And when a man's wife 

 cannot untangle his ideas he is in a bad 

 way. 



Politics for making strange bedfellows 

 isn't a circumstance beside bee-keeping, 

 and for making odd combinations of 

 professions and developing versatility, it 

 is fully equal. One young man of my 

 acquaintance is a lirst-class artist in 

 photography, and is a good bee-keeper 

 too — no, you need not ruffle up your 

 feathers for I may mean you. Another 

 combines law with bee-keeping, possibly 

 hoping to influence the bees therewith. 

 Another dispenses pills, but he is no 

 more successful than the rest of us in 

 curing foul brood. Another dabbles in 

 sociology, caught it from "Ye Ferainine 

 Monarchie'' perhaps. Still another has 

 astronomy for a by-play, which goes to 

 show how elevating is bee-keeping. But 

 most wonderful example of all is in the 

 Home of the Honey Bees; there even the 

 A I R is versatile. 



I will close this letter, as I began it. 

 with a quotation from Holmes : 



' 'And if I should live to be 

 The last leaf on the tree 



In the Spring, 

 Let them smile as I do now 

 At the old forsaken bough 



Where I cling." 



Yours as ever, 



John Hakdscrabble. 



"In Ceylon the natives, when they find 

 a swarm of bees hanging on a tree, hold 

 burning torches under them. As the bees 

 drop, the natives catch them in cloths, 

 carry them home, boil them and eat them." 



"In Wales there are great areas devoted 

 to the growing of leeks and onions for seed. 

 The bees gather from the leek and onion 

 blossoms honey that is freely flavored with 

 the peculiar taste of those rank vegetables." 



ROADSIDE WEEDS. 



IT IS the general verdict among api- 

 arists that to grow any known plant 

 for its honey alone would scarcely 

 be profitable; yet it is equally regarded 

 as unquestioned that there are standard 

 crops, as the clovers, buckwheat, rape, 

 etc., which have a double value; that in 

 themselves to the agriculturist, and in 

 their nectar to the bee-keeper. As to 

 the profit in growing these, there can be 

 no question. 



There are many roadside dwellers, 

 however, comparatively unimportant 

 because of their small numbers, which 

 yet serve an important purpose in filling 

 out gaps in the main honey flow. These 

 plants are often destroyed through 

 thoughtlessness or ignorance, when 

 their preservation might mean a materi- 

 al increase of honey or pollen with no 

 further sacrifice to the owner of the 

 hives than a little so-called neatness. 

 Weeds pure and simple are not attract- 

 ive, yet when they assume the qualities 

 of usefulness they are no longer weeds. 

 One of the most important of these for 

 its individual merits, though by no 

 means the most common, is the figwort. 

 Scrophularia nodosa, rare in New Eng- 

 land but found from New York to Kan- 

 sas, North Carolina and Tennessee, fre- 

 quenting woods and hedges. It is a 

 weedy-looking plant from three to ten 

 feet high, with a four-angled stem, leaves 

 opposite and toothed, and small green- 

 ish-purple flowers. The latter are two- 

 lipped, the two upper lobes being longer 

 and erect, the lateral ones ascending, 

 and the lower spreading and reflexed. 

 Though to the botanist the corolla is 

 beautifully constructed, the casual ob- 

 server may, on account of the inconspic- 

 uous hues and shortness of the lobes, 

 almost overlook it. Prof. Cook says that 

 it affords abundant nectar from July 

 until frost, and recommends it highly for 

 scattering about in waste places. 



A. I. Root offers seed of it under the 

 name common among bee-keepers, Simp- 



