242 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



[May, 



"Mr. Novice! do you know you are laying the 

 blame all on some one else when you really neg- 

 lected the bees? Do you know that it is a positive 

 duty of yours to acknowledge leaving the Quinby 

 hive on its summer stand without so much as remov- 

 ing the boxes?" 



But it was so large we couldn't carry it into the 

 bee-house. 



" Then you should have removed the boxes and 

 turned the frames, and packed it according to Mr. 

 Q's directions." 



So we should have done, but it was almost dark 

 when the balance were housed, and the next day 

 was stormy, and — and — there were no more pleasant 

 days all winter. 



" You mean you were careless and negligent, just 

 as those are that you say should never attempt 

 to keep bees. If Adair's conjecture that you neg- 

 lected the Quinby hive in spring and summer, was 

 incorrect, he certainly would have been right had 

 he mentioned Autumn and Winter care." 



But would they not have had the dysentery any 

 way? you know they had natural stores. Next 

 winter we will give them sugar syrup too, as you 

 are satisfied now it is the best ; and for the present 

 we will immediately put one of our finest colonies 

 in the hive and try and demonstrate that " we too, 

 can raise box honey." 



By the way, Mr. Editor, we are pleased to notice 

 an advertisement of hives in the April number 

 for $ 1.00 besides our own. AVe have never seen Mr. 

 Stinebring, and do not know how his hive is made, 

 but he bears a good reputation, and we hope more 

 manufactures of $1.00 hives may follow in his track. 

 We really hope they may not meet with the abuse 

 we have received in breaking the first furrow in 

 this direction. AVe have plenty of other employ- 

 ment and when some one else will do better work 

 than we have done, for the same pay or less, we 

 will welcome them as benefactors to our bee-keeping 

 friends. 



So far as stirring up trouble is concerned, we 

 jsb.aU, with your permission, Mr. Editor, overhaul 

 all articles written with motives of profit by patentees 

 of hives, and accept the abuse that follows as a mat- 

 ter of course. 



When "rights" are dropped, and patentees turn 

 their attention toward making good hives at a fair 

 price, (and this result seems even now dawning), 

 we shall be ready to drop personalities, having ac- 

 complished all that we desired. And the thought 

 of even having contributed a little toward hasten- 

 ing this result, will be ample compensation to 



Novice. 



P. S. — AVe accept the challenge on page 225, with 

 the most friendly feelings, providing it is under- 

 taken not to see who "licks," but to determine par- 

 tially which way occupies most time. We believe 

 Mr. Oldt is not a "patent hive man," (those who 

 abuse us are, almost invariably ) , and so we will accept 

 his simple statement ; and we believe the readers of 

 the A. B. J. will, as a general rule prefer our simple 

 statement to that of " responsible judges," but we 

 are not over particular. AVe think the honey should 

 be removed from the hive and prepared all ready 

 for shipping. About five hundred pounds is a com- 

 fortable day's work in our opinion for a man, with 

 a woman or girl for an assistant. Katy Grimm did I 



much more than this however, but her days' works 

 we think must have been more than comfortable. 

 If Mr. Oldt can remove the bees without losing or 

 killing any from five hundred pounds in boxes in 

 less than a day, we think he must have some new 

 appliances, or possibly box honey is not as much 

 trouble as we have been led to think ; in either 

 case we shall be very glad to hear of improved facil- 

 ities in handling honey. 



[Fur the American Bee Journal.] 



Improved Breeds of Bees. 



BY D. L. ADAIR. 



In a communication in the April number A. B. 

 J., I attempted to show that we cannot improve our 

 bees by further indiscriminate importations from 

 Italy, and that enough of them had been brought 

 to this country to answer our purposes. I further 

 took the ground that we will have to establish dis- 

 tinct breeds for ourselves, as neither the Italian nor 

 the American bees are uniform in any desirable 

 characteristic. 



All living things, animal or vegetable, have a 

 tendency to change their natures. None of our 

 domesticated animals are what they were originally. 

 Our cultivated fruits and vegetables are far removed 

 from their original nature, and are still sporting 

 into new forms, and taking on peculiarities of most 

 remarkable kinds. 



Man cannot create or destroy a particle of mat- 

 ter, but. he can take advantage of the laws govern- 

 ing matter, and make it subserve his wants. It 

 required no great intelligence in the first tillers of 

 the soil to induce them to select the best of their 

 crops for seed, nor in the first herdsmen to select 

 their best and most easily managed animals to 

 breed from. Jacob seems to have been so well 

 acquainted with this law of variations that he was 

 enabled to change the color of the cattle he had 

 charge of, and spot and stripe them as he pleased. 



In a wild state, in their natural habitat, these 

 variations are but slight, and soon breed back to the 

 natural type, but when animals or plants are 

 removed and subjected to new conditions, the 

 changes in character are often very sudden and 

 marked. A most notable instance of this is the 

 turkey, which was unknown until the discovery of 

 America. All efforts at domestication here have 

 been failures. It has been frequently semi-domes- 

 ticated, but even after generations, it has reverted 

 to its wild habits. About 300 years ago it was 

 taken to Europe, where it encountered different 

 conditions of existence — a difference in its food and 

 in climate. The result was, that in adapting itself 

 to the new order of things, its primitive nature was 

 broken up. It varied, and the result was that it was 

 not only thoroughly tamed, but like Jacob's cattle, 

 it changed its color ; some became darker, some 

 white, others yellow, while others again became 

 spotted. And the change was so radical that when 

 brought back, it retained its domestic nature, and 

 has not reverted to its wild state. 



The potato is a similar instance among vegetables. 

 A little more than a hundred years ago it was taken 

 from Spanish America to Europe. Under new con- 

 ditions it varied from the insignificant tuber it was, 



