THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



[July, 



please, for you will have some chance of com- 

 pensation for your time and trouble And then 

 about foul-brood, don't waste your time smok- 

 ing it with sulphur, or weary yourself in vain by 

 walking over to the "thread-factory" to dip the 

 frames in hyposulphates and chlorides, and then 

 indulge the false, perhaps fatal hope that the 

 foul thing is done for, but treat them as every 

 wise farmer treats a sheep-killing dog, or a 

 glandered horse, — crush, burn — utterly destroy — 

 and then you may have some hope that you may 

 have exorcised the fell spirit ; but tamper or 

 temporize with it, and the chances are as 100 

 to 1 that the whole body apistic will soon be 

 hopelessly and ineradicably tainted. Apropos: 

 May not those addled eggs (of which Leuckart 

 writes so observantly) furnish in their putrid 

 embryos, the seeds of death instead of the germ 

 of life? May not this be, after all, tiie fountain 

 of foul-brood ? 



3. I wish I could feel the flush of the pro- 

 phetic enthusiasm which already hears the hum 

 of the "coming bee;" but I fear we have to 

 pass through "many varieties of untried bee- 

 ing" before that avator arrives. Nature is too 

 jealous of her glorious handy-work to yield at 

 once to "idle dreams" and empirical exchanges. 

 As Tennyson sings, 



" So careful of the type she seems, 

 So careless of the single life," 



that many long years of systematic and scien- 

 tific efforts must be made with an energy and 

 perseverance that countless failures cannot daunt 

 before we can even hope for that "fixity" which 

 shall assure us (as orator Phillips might say, if 

 he were of our craft) that we have at last ob- 

 tained the full and perfect bee which shall ex- 

 hibit in one glow of banded beauty the loveliness 

 of Italy and the fecundity of America I (Very 

 fine, isn't it?) 



4. Coming down to practical matters, I wish 

 to say a few more words about the best form of 

 receptacles for surplus honey. I have already 

 spoken of the English glasses. As these may be 

 rejected on account of cost, let me call attention 

 to the principle of Mr. Colvin's honey chambers. 

 These chambers are (as some of the readers of 

 the Journal doubtless know) nothing but boxes 

 of the same size as the hive below, with seven 

 frames somewhat wider, and each frame con- 

 taining two movable sections. When these are 

 filled with honey they can be easily removed, 

 the wooden frame protects the honey (about 

 two pounds in each section), and by judicious 

 packing in boxes made specially they can be 

 transported unharmed for any distance. These 

 sections can be made of any size and placed in 

 the lower as well as in the upper hive, vertically, 

 I should advise, so as to avoid too many begin- 

 nings of combs. The reduced size, say seven by 

 eight, of the combs would make them more sal- 

 able, whilst the cost of renewal would be slight. 



5. Are we going to "give it up so" about 

 that substantial testimonial to our real king-bee 

 (not H. A.), the venerable and well deserving 

 Langstroth ? Are we so ungrateful that we can 

 forget the inestimable service he has done to 

 our cause ? can we forget that out of a mere pas- 



time he has made a science? That by his skill 

 and observation he has given a profession, and 

 brought profit to thousands? Shall we, above 

 all, by our lukewarmness strengthen the hands 

 of his enemies who are seeking to embitter the 

 short remnant of his days, and would, if they 

 could, hound him to his grave. Don't tell me 

 that he got up in open convention and begged 

 that nothing more might be done. Of course ne 

 did ! and anybody with a tithe of his modesty 

 would have done the same thing. And even if it 

 were right to stop them, it seems eminently 

 right to begin again now — his veracity, his 

 honor, his fair name which he values above all 

 things else, are assailed by the foul-brood of 

 our community, and we owe it to ourselves not 

 less than to him, that we should show the world 

 we love and honor him, and how we despise and 

 scorn his traducers. Come, my brethren, let us 

 warm up our hearts to a movable frame, and 

 prepare a solid, substantial testimonial for Mr. 

 Langstroth, that shall in some measure compen- 

 sate him. Come ! 



[For the American Bee Journal.] 



Basswood. 



Mr Editor. Thinking that a report of our 

 proceedings for the past season of 1871 may be 

 of interest to your readers, we herewith send it. 

 We started in spring with 28 swarms of Italian 

 bees, part of them hybrid. We have increased 

 them to 76, chiefly by artificial swarming, with 

 from 23 to 35 pounds of honey in each hive to 

 winter in. 



Our honey product stands as follows : 

 White clover, extracted 350 lbs. 



Basswood, " 1650 " 



Mixed and buckwheat, " 656 " 



Box honey, 300 " 



The extracted honey we sent to Philadelphia. 

 Our bees did not do much on white clover, but 

 when basswood came in bloom (July loth), the 

 bees kept us busy emptying out honey. We were 

 fairly swimming in honey for about two weeks. 

 We never saw bees gather honey faster than 

 they did from basswood blossoms. Good swarms 

 would till their hives in two days when they had 

 empty comb. 



Now we see the necessity of urging the bee- 

 keepers to cultivate the basswood. There is a 

 great quantity of small basswood trees in the 

 woods in this section which we can get to trans- 

 plant. Had it not been for basswood. we would 

 not have got any profit from our bees. 



We have built us a bee house, 12 by 16 feet, 

 with walls of saw dust, 11 inches thick on the 

 four sides, and 8 iuches thick on the floor and 

 overhead, with two ventilators through the floor, 

 5 inches square, and one in the ceiling, 6 inches 

 in diameter. 



We have 84 swarms in the house now, and 

 there are hardly any dead bees under the hive, 

 compared to those out of doors. We bought 

 some bees last fall, and are wintering some out 

 of doors, and some in the bee-house, so that we 

 can see which way of wintering is the best. 



