1894 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



389 



idds, " Yon know you will iipver read all of 

 :,hf'ni. anvliow." I'.iil I keop thinking I am go- 

 ng to ciiicli up. Well, during ilie evening in 

 juesiioii 1 was; sitting at my aecustomid secre- 

 ary: and. by the way. below my books and pa- 

 pers there ai'e some drawers that I never use, 

 vhich she has appropriated for the childrens' 

 ;lothing. etc. When she wishes to get at one 

 )f these drawers. I am obliged to move away 

 ust a little. Well, now. please notice right 

 vhilt I was in tlu^ midst of this very eloquent 

 ippeal to doinitieering husbands, she came iu 

 n a great hurry and wanted to get into one of 

 hose drawers. I was so fully occupied with my 

 eading that I did not move until I felt the 

 vell-known corner of tlie drawer against my 

 lees. JNly friend, when your whole mind is 

 ken up or absorbed with something you are 

 rying to grasp, did you never feel a little ir- 

 itabliity because somebody bumped or pushed 

 ou? If so, you can understand me. Had my 

 :ood wife said, '■ Husband, will you please pump 

 onH> water and fill the reservoir?"' I would have 

 umped up with alacrity, feeling pleased to 

 hink she permitted me to use my strength so 

 s to save her own. But this other, somehow, 

 truck me differently ; and, if I recollectaright, 

 grumbled a little as follows: "Oh! I do wish 

 on would keep your things somewhere else 

 ban in these particular drawers that must be 

 ot at when 1 am specially iuierested." Then 

 went on reading as before; and, come to think 

 f it. I do not believe my conscience troubled 

 le very much eithei'. In about four minutes, 

 ack she came, and was tugging at the drawer, 

 nd bumping it against my knees as before. I 

 jokyd up and she said, very mildly, "If I were 

 fraid of you I would not come back to bother 

 ou qiute so soon. But you see I am not a bit 

 fraid, even when you scold." And then I be- 

 an wondering whether I was not, after all, a 

 ttle bit domineering. Oh, dear me! if it were 

 ot for the grace of God, and for the love of 

 'hrist Jesus which has all these years had a 

 ermanent lodging-place in the hearts not only 

 f myself and wife, but. I trust as well, in the 

 earts of every one of the five God has given 

 s. with my special characteristic traits, with 

 ^y impulsive and perhaps aggressive tenden- 

 ies. I shudder to think of the mischief Satan 

 light have done in our home in this especial 

 ine we have been considering. Now, I have 

 ot said very much about our text, and I am 

 oing to finish without doing more than to 

 uote the verse that follows the text at the head 

 f this talk. 



But it shall not be so among- you: but whosoever 

 Mil lie great iimong-you, let him be your minister. 

 -Matt. 20:26 



GAKDENING IN WINTER. 



Perhaps I should explain a little in the first 

 lace, by saying that Ernest took, from the 

 oof of our machine-shop, a photograph of the 

 piary, without telling me any thing about it; 

 herefore I did not have any time to arrange 

 hings or to take off some of the sashes. (See 

 ngraving on page 270.) The glimpse you get is 



haphazard one looking in upon us unawares, 

 'he special point I wish to call your attention 

 3 is the effect of the exhaust steam. One bed 



the one nearest the factory — does not show in 

 stie cut at all. 

 ei Let us commence at the lower left-hand cor- 



ner of the picture where you see the nnni have 

 been drawing basswood through the apiary to 

 tlie lumber-yards. I knew the groiuid wciuld 

 be thawed out all winttu' where this roadway 

 crosses my line of beds; and to prevent a great 

 mud-hole at tlu^ ciossing 1 put in an imnu^ise 

 piece of sawed flagging somi' s or 10 feet square. 

 This stone soon became warm— soiuctinu-s quite 

 hot; and it has had scarcely a l)jt of snow on 

 it this winter, for it has thawed off as fast as it 

 fell. The men who draw basswood v(>ry soon 

 began to complain of the mud-hole on each side 

 of this stone; therefore we piled in lots of tin 

 scrap from the tin-shop, and then covered the 

 scrap with coal cinders; but it took so much 

 time to make decent traveling that it reminded 

 me of the Slough of Despond wliere so many 

 cartloads of road material were apparently 

 wasted. 



Well, this exhaust steam did some other 

 things that we did not calculate on. Down by 

 th(i pump you will see where the snow is thaw- 

 ed off as well as along the beds. This is right 

 over the water pipe that carries water fiom 

 the big windmill on the hill down to the barn, 

 for watering the stock. This watei'-pipe hap- 

 pened to cross the tile carrying ihe exhaust 

 steam, coming pretty close to said lile. The 

 consequence is, that, without planning for it at 

 all, we have warm water for our stock to drink, 

 no matter how near zero the weather may be! 

 The ground becomes so hot near that tile car- 

 rying the exhaust steam, that it heats a good 

 many feet each way; therefore from 13 to 30 

 feet the standing vvater in this pipe is more or 

 less warm. When some is taken out to water 

 stock, this hot column of water moves down 

 toward the barn. Some more becomes hot, and 

 this moves down, and soon; and you just ought 

 to see the rank dandelions along the line of 

 that water-pipe. They have been in bloom 

 more or less all through February and March. 



Let us now walk along toward the house, 

 which you see in the opposite corner of the 

 picture from where you started. You will 

 notice the snow is thawed from the ground for 

 several feet away from the glass. This ground 

 also dries up .'^o quickly that it is dry ground to 

 walk on, mosi uf the time, even in winter. 

 The most trouble we have had with our beds is 

 with too much heat; and you will notice some 

 of the sash are drawn a little to one side, even 

 though it was a cold winter day, with no sun 

 shining, when the picture was taken. The 

 end of the bed nearest the roadway is where I 

 have been getting ripe strawberries. During the 

 last of February, however, the cold was so great 

 that the green strawberries were either frosted 

 a little or cooked by too much heat— I can't yet 

 tell which. Had we used shutters or straw 

 mats over the sash for a few nights, it would 

 probably have been better; for such intense 

 cold outside of the glass, and so great a heat 

 inside, do not seem to be quite the thing for 

 tender stuff'. 



Over at the further end of the beds you will 

 notice a cloth-covered frame. This is double 

 width — that is, the width of two sash. During 

 a warm spell in January I had in this frame a 

 nice show of beets, spinach, and onions. In 

 fact, there was stuff there almost large enough 

 to sell; but during the severe freezes in Febru- 

 ary, pretty much every thing was lost. Of 

 course, we had heat enough; but it does not 

 make much difference how great a heat you 

 have; with only a cloth cover between the 

 plants inside and almost zero weather onts'uZe, 

 the thing does not work, as I have explained. 

 Cloth covers will do very well over onions and 

 strawberries, or things e(iually hardy, provid- 

 ing you do not have very much heat under- 

 neath the cloth. I think cloth covers would, 



