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THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



March 1, 1906 



sacrificed his apiary to save the property of a neighbor. This 

 may not be called freakish; heroism. I suppose, is the right 

 name for it. This was in Southern California. 



One item from up north- a bit was where a swarm of bees 

 lit on an Indian child and stung him to death. I suppose if 

 the youngster was of the white race, and was not so rankishly 

 odorous as the little redskin must have been, the bees would 

 have spared the urchin. The result of the insult to the tribe 

 of diggers was that the council held to settle the matter, issued 

 a proclamation of war. Thereupon every Indian squaw, buck 

 and papoose sallied forth and waged war upon the kingdom 

 of the bees. The slaughter of the bees in that county was 

 ruthless ; honey flowed upon the ground, dead -bees lay upon 

 the sod, and many a lusty buck Indian writhed in the mud 

 from the numerous stings hurled about his eyelids. I have 

 not learned if the war is ended. Perhaps President Roosevelt 

 might arrange for a Peace Commission to settle the trouble 

 at our National Capital. 



Here is another from upper California — in Lake County — 

 and I hope the unfortunate gentleman referred to is no rela- 

 tive of the editor c>f the "Old Reliable." I might hint that Hie 

 "House of York" should not have been vanquished by so 

 small a fighter as a bee. I give the telegram in full : 



"Santa Rosa. Calif.. July 11.— Ed York, a resident of 

 Upper Lake, returned to his home from this city on the 

 evening train minus one of his" legs. This is the result of the 

 sting of a honey-bee and is one of the few cases on record 

 where the sting of a bee has caused the loss of a leg. It is 

 believed that the sting. of the insect carried infectious matter 

 into the man's system when it stung him, and that the result 

 was blood-poisoning. Amputation was necessary to save the 

 man's life. York was stung after he had left his home, and 

 it was necessary to have the operation performed here before 

 he could be removed to his home in the northern county. 

 York suffered excruciating pains after blood-poisoning set in." 



Did the man lose his leg through the sting of a bee? and 

 where did the telegraphic writer, or the originator of the 

 story, get his information that this "is one of the few cases 

 on record where the sting of a bee has caused the loss of a 

 leg? I have never heard of such a case before; neither do I 

 believe there is any record at all of such a case. It is very 

 seldom, indeed, that a person is stung on the leg. There are 

 other places where a sting might cause more serious trouble. 

 In a case like the one reported, it may not be infectious mat- 

 ter that the bee injected into Mr. York's system, but, perhaps, 

 the unfortunate victim's system was in bad condition, and the 

 poison of the sting may have brought about a condition where 

 the combination of several poisons brought on a third and 

 dangerous. The statement that he was stung after he left 

 his home, and had his leg amputated on his return, seems 

 strong. I believe the report must be incorrect, unless the 

 man had been away some time. I have heard of persons 

 being blood-poisoned when away from home, but never by 

 the sting of a bee. 



From Southern California comes the record of a true 

 hero, and his name should find a place in all apicultural 

 records. The pity is that the brave bov gave up his life in 

 his endeavor to save his sister. I give this clipping as it 

 appeared in our daily papers of Aug. 10, 1905: 



,n " San , J Bernardino - Calif, Aug. 9.— Cecil Sharpless. the 

 lU-year-old son of C. W. Sharpless, a prominent apiarist 

 who resides at Whittier, died this evening at 7:30 o'clock 

 after suffering since this morning from a. rattlesnake bite 

 With his sister he had gone to an apiarv in Little Creek 16 

 miles from here, and while the children were playing about 

 the honey-house a rattler crawled from under the buildin^ in 

 front of the girl. ° 



"Cecil quickly seized the snake to save his sister when 

 the reptile buried its fangs in his right hand between the 

 thumb and first linger. The little girl ran a quarter of a mile 

 to where the father was working, screaming that her brother 

 was being bitten by a snake. 



"The father found the little boy in terrible agony and 

 sought an ammonia bottle which had been kept on hand for 

 such emergencies, but the bottle was empty, and, tying a 

 rope about the child's arm, he hurried with him to Glen' Helen 

 ranch, where the manager cut open the wound and, witli his 

 lips, tried to suck out the poison. The swelling of the arm 

 continued, and tin- boy was hurried to town in a wagon The 

 horses ran away and the boy had his foot crushed. His hand 

 is as black as coal to the wrist and the arm is swollen to twice 

 its normal size." San Francisco, Calif . 



Ihe Premiums we offer are all well worth working for 

 Look at them in this copy of the American Bee Joi'maL 



What I Do With a Crop of Honey 



BY C. W. DAYTON. 



IT is 32 miles from our place here to Los Angeles, and 6 

 miles farther to Florence, in the southeast part of the 

 city, where our other place is located. At Florence there 

 is a completely furnished 7-room house, shops, honey-house, 

 barn and wagon shed, and usually a fair-sized apiary amongst 

 grape-vines and numerous fruit-trees. We own both places — 

 no rents, no debts. We produce our honey at Chatsworth, 

 and take it to Florence to sell it. If the distance was 500 

 miles the same tactics would be followed. When we bought, 

 at Florence, 9 years ago, it was in the country, but it is now 

 thickly settled — houses and stores all around. Then land was 

 $150 per acre; now $2,000, or more. 



When I get ready to sell some honey I put it on the 

 train here at Chatsworth, so that I can get it from the freight 

 depot as I pass through Los Angeles. I pay 15 cents per 100 

 pounds to ship it rather than haul it over the 32 miles of 

 rough and dusty roads. I choose a time when the roads are 

 good, and the moon lights the way. I retire at 7 in the even- 

 ing; and awake at 12 or 1 o'clock; hitch up and start out. 

 coming into the city at 10 or 11 o'clock in the forenoon, and 

 go to my brother-in-law's for dinner. 



After dinner, of this trip, I took a stroll around amongst 

 the commission and wholesale houses with a quart jar of 

 honey in hand. I took this time 48 quart jars of honey to 

 the city by wagon. The best that was mentioned was 4^4 

 cents for water-white, and they were not disposed to buy at 

 that price. Everybody seemed to have plenty of honey on 

 hand. 



As my friends urged me to remain till morning before 

 •proceeding to Florence, I set out to devise some way to 

 "while awav" the afternoon, so I unloaded most of the cases 

 of honey and started from near the center of the city to 

 peddle out the four dozen quart jars and six 60-pound cans 

 in cases. These last I took along to make my load "show up." 

 The city is "lousy" with truck-wagons carrying vegetables, 

 fruit and a large share honey also. Everybody knows the 

 contents of these wagons, but mine was different, and drew 

 some curiosity. I want no letters — let them come and see 

 what my wagon contains. They recognize the cases as "orig- 

 inal packages" as honey comes in from the mountains, and 

 if it is allowed to pass their houses and reach the dealers' 

 hands there will be several middle-mens' profits to pay. My 

 wagon-box is small and low-down, so that a few cases of 

 honey appear like considerable of a load. These trucksters 

 buy only a case or a single can at a time ; keep it at home, 

 from which they pour out from two to six jars full of honey, 

 sufficient for a day on the wagon. 



It was 2:10 when I started and 5:45 when I returned in 

 the evening. Entirely new territory. I sold 39 quart jars 

 at 25 cents each for the honey they contained, and one 5-gallon 

 can divided among three families at 7 cents a pound, by the 

 gallon. I received $13.95, net, for all. If I had sold that 177 

 pounds at the wholesalers' it would have brought $7.08, net, 

 after deducting the cost of cans and cases — a difference of 

 $6.87. Besides, I was paid 5 cents each for a number of jars 

 for which I paid only 3 cents each. 



It has been pretty well settled that it costs 4 cents a 

 pound to produce honey, yet 4 to 5 cents are amongst the 

 high figures which have been prevailing here! Now, if I 

 keep on selling 177 pounds a day. and working only 3 I <2 hours 

 a day, my 12 tons will all be gone in less than 6 months, and 

 will have rendered a profit of more than equal to a crop of 

 50 tons at 5 cents a pound. It takes hired help to handle 50 

 tons and about five times as many bees to produce 50 tons 

 as to produce 12 tons. 



It used to be said that "bees work for nothing and board 

 themselves.'' When that was true the woods swarmed with 

 venison, the pasture on the clearings was free to anybody's 

 cattle which could find it, and fences were built with walnut 

 rails. 



I waited in a new store 40 minutes while the store-keeper 

 waited on several customers, hoping that I could sell him 10 

 jars, which would entirely clear up my four dozen; but he 

 took only one jar for his own family, and said that his trade 

 seemed to demand nothing larger than a 10-ounce tumbler, a 

 few of which he already had. 



To procure, wash and fill three dozen jars to replace 

 those sold kept me till 9 o'clock the next morning. On the 

 way to Florence I sold $9 worth, arriving about 11:30 a. m. ; 

 but 'I went to two boarding houses where I sold 5-gallon cans 

 last April. At one there was about one-fourth of the can 

 unused. The landlady said they got down to the sugar it was 



