1873.] 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



61 



[For the American Bee Journal.] 



Greenhorn's Views of Some Things. 



Mr. Editor.— As your paper seems to be 

 open for discussion, I will inflict on you and 

 your readers some of my green ideas. 



Every man has an undoubted right to defend 

 his own property, but if that property should 

 be offered for sale, then the public has a right 

 to examine and fix its value. Any individual 

 member of the public has the right to express 

 his opinion thereof, both orally and in print. 

 These are the rights on both sides, and in 

 Greenhorn's opinion neither party has a right 

 to complain ot the other, unless false statements 

 are made. 



Now the patent beehive men come at us 

 " o-reenies " with their flaming advertisements, 

 praising their property, and how are we to 

 judge properly of the thing, unless we can get 

 som° cute " Novice " or other to point out the 

 defects too ? With both sides of the picture, 

 then we can judge for ourselves. 



Friends Hazen, Alley and others pitch into 

 Novice as if he has committed some great crime, 

 contending that, as the laws of the country have 

 given them patent rights, they are therefore at 

 liberty to kill us greenies secundem artem, and 

 if any blame is to be attached it must be laid to 

 the laws, and not to the patentees ; and, like the 

 doctors, their song is, " God giveth and God 

 taketh away; praised be the name of God; 

 though sometimes the worst blunders and im- 

 positions have been made. 



Now, sir, setting aside the fact of great lati- 

 tude being allowed in the matter of granting 

 patent rights, let us suppose a man gets a patent 

 for s(mething in my line of business, and I find 

 it is of little or no value to me, must I buy it 

 because he has got the patent ? And if a friend 

 applies to me for my opinion of it, must I re- 

 fuse it because a patent has been granted on it ? 

 This is Novice's situation. By experience he 

 has found out the futility of many of the 

 so-called improvements, and as we greenies have 

 discovered (Novice's pieces A. B. J.), that he 

 has sharp eyes as well as a sharp pen. we have 

 made bold to ask his advice, and have induced 

 him to publish his advice. (Gleanings.) Now, 

 as long as Novice is honest in his statements, 

 has any one a right to say, stop him ? I think 

 not. . 



Let us see if we greenies don't need him— just 

 one, out of many examples. Not a hundred miles 

 from here lives a fellow-greeny, who was run afoul 

 of by a flaming patent-right man, and bled to 

 the tune of $30.0U. Farm right and hive, simply 

 for the privilege of placing four hives back to 

 back, with holes communicating; and also 

 placing smaller boxes in like manner on top. 

 What a pity Novice was not on hand with his 

 friendly nudgein-the-side. (Gleanings.) His 

 pitiful seventy-five cents saves many a $30.00, 

 more or less, in the United States. 



If I understand Novice aright, he means to 

 unearth all worthless patent rights in the bee 

 line, and I for one must say, success betido 

 him. Here is what he says, Gleanings, Vol. I, 

 No. 1, p. 1 : 



" One of the most lamentable wrongs in bee 

 culture is the custom of taking money for a 

 ' a right to make and use ' a hive, knowing that 

 the buyer could ' make and use ' a hive so nearly . 

 like it as to answer every purpose, without 

 using a ' single one of the patented features.' 

 It will be our especial aim to fully inform the 

 public of all such transactions." 



In another number. Novice says that the 

 above challenge should be a bomb-shell, and 

 from the way the fur is flying, I think his shell 

 bids fair to be effective. 



Once more : If a man has in reality anything 

 that is valuable, he need not fear that we 

 greenies will throw it aside (when satisfied of 

 its utility), though Novice's bomb-shell should 

 explode near by ; for those shells will not hurt 

 anything which is of itself bomb-proof— truth- 

 ful and useful. Yours in need of light, 



Greenhorn. 



[For the American Bee Journal.] 



A Day with Mr. Adam Grimm. 



The 4th of August will always be remem- 

 bered by me as a pleasant day, for it was spent 

 with Wisconsin's bee-keeper in looking over 

 his hundreds of swarms of Italian bees. After 

 a walk of a mile and a half through the hot 

 sun from the depot, I reached his cool, pleasant 

 retreat, and found him up to his eyes m bees. 

 He o-ave me a warm welcome, with a smile on 

 his "genial face that showed his hospitable 

 nature. It did not take long to get acquainted, 

 and we were soon deeply engaged m talking 

 bee and Mr. Grimm can talk, and knows what 

 he talks about. He was busily engaged m ex- 

 amining stocks, taking out honey, forming 

 nuclei, introducing queens, etc., and getting his 

 stocks ready to send off to the buckwheat fields, 

 which he had been doing for several days; two 

 loads a day generally, twelve to sixteen hives 

 to a load. His boys do the hauling, while he 

 prepares them for their new harvest. He now 

 has eight hundred (800) swarms in eleven (11) 

 apiaries, from four (4) to eleven (11) miles from 

 his home apiary, and it keeps him on the jump 

 to tend to them all. Says he hardly gets time 

 to read tlie Journal, much less to write tor it. 

 We will excuse him noiv, but when the season a 

 work is over, and his little pets all safe and 

 snug, then we shall expect to see something 

 from him in the Journal. Basswood is his 

 main dependence, but this year his bees were 

 not in the best condition to profit by it so he 

 will not have so large an amount of box-honey 

 as he otherwise would. . 



He has no stocks or queens to sell, pretermg 

 to keep and increase them another year. He 



