1886 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



.50'.) 



dollars or more; and I have seen men peddling- ti- 

 g-ers' skeletons at so much per ounce, for a tonic. 

 But these, while very good, would not be equal, 

 they think, to the human article, if any one cared 

 or dared to prepare it. I have heard of Chinese 

 soldiers even forcing- themselves to eat the liver of 

 an enemy killed in battle, to increase their courage, 

 for they think the liver is the scat of courage. 



A distinguished Chinese statesman and general 

 who died last year is said to have lost a son in the 

 following manner: This son had a piece of flesh 

 cut from his arm to make a tonic for his mother, 

 and bled to death in consequence; so there were 

 those who affirmed that the peculiar potency of our 

 foreign medicines is due to the use of human vitals 

 ill their prc^paration. This scandal, however, did 

 not gain sufficient currency to make us serious 

 trouble. There were a few Foochow women in the 

 neighborhood, of bold manner, who came to see the 

 foreign women, iind brought numbers of the more 

 timid women with them; and they were always 

 shown all over the house, up stairs and down. By 

 and by the wife of a beloved native helper, who 

 had grown worse as her husband had grown better, 

 had to be divorced. Her relatives made a big row 

 about it; but it gave the finishing stroke to the 

 medicine slander. Jt showed, also, that the wife of 

 a Christian could not sin against her husband with 

 the same impunity that a Chinaman could sin 

 against his wife. 



The truth slowly gains ground. The Chinese 

 have long admitted that Western nations excel in 

 the mechanical arts, but they have comforted them- 

 selves with the belief that they themselves excelled 

 in manners and morals. Now the painful, humbling 

 idea begins to press them that the followers of 

 Christ excel in these things also; and their boasted 

 Confucius must yield to a Gue.vter One. We try to 

 make them understand that Jesus is not a Western 

 sage, but the divine Savior from heaven who docs 

 for us what no sage can do; and that we are come 

 hither, not to humiliate them, but to save them. 



Foochow, China, May 4, ISeO. J. E. Walkeu. 



CLIPPING QUEENS' WINGS 19 

 YEARS AGO. 



A TASTE OE VIItGir., 



T HAVE been clipping my queens' wings to con- 

 ||[ trol- swarming. I got the idea from your A B 

 ^r C book, and, with some few draw-backs, it is 

 "*■ good. I think I clipped the wings of some old 

 queens, and they died off and left the swarm 

 queenless. But what bothers me is, that j-ou bee- 

 men began the habit only of late years, since the 

 improved frame hives have teen in use; and I find, 

 on reading Book IV. of the Georgics of Virgil, that 

 the Italians used to clii) their qucen-becs' wings for 

 the safe-keeping of a restless swarm. I quote a 

 translation of his original Latin, from the 103d to 

 the 108th verse, inclusive: 



" But when the roving swarms fly about and fport 

 in the air, disdain their hives, and leave their habit- 

 ations cold, j-ou will restrain their unsettled minds 

 from their vain play; nor is there groat difficulty in 

 restraining them ; do you but clip the wings of their 

 kings ("tu i-ci/ilnis alan* cripr"). not one will dare, 

 while they (their kings) stay behind, to fly aloft, or 

 pluck up the standard from the camp." 



IIow did they, in his day, 19:0 yenrg ago, get f^\ tlie 



queens to clip their wings, unless they had movable 

 frames ? 



I feel compensated in thinking over the fact that 

 he knew all that before we did, only in the other 

 fact that the old poet did not know they were 

 queRHs and not kiims. James J. Slade. 



Columbus. Ga., June 18, 1886. 



If I render correctly from the Latin 

 whicli you (juote, Virgil does not recommend 

 to clip tlie kin<i:''s wings, but to tear the wings 

 from off tlie king. "The Latin word " er- 

 ipio,^'' of which '' cripe''^ is the imperative, 

 never means, so far as I can ascertain, to 

 clip or cut, etc. However, the rendering 

 whicli you give probably best conveys the 

 idea to bee-keepers of the present day. At 

 any rate, ^'irgil recognized the fact 1900 

 years ago, that crippling the queens' wings 

 prevented, to a large extent, swarms leaving 

 altogether. I think that Virgil meant that 

 the bee-keepeis of his day should catch the 

 queen in the cluster after her bees had 

 swarmed. This, then, would not necessarily 

 imply that the Koinans had movable-frame 

 hives. — Many thanks for calling our atten- 

 tion to this inatter of bee-history. Perhaps 

 friend Hasty can give us another dish of 

 Virgil upon "this matter. Ernest. 



.^ — ^ — ^ ■ 



THE TENT FOR CATCHING SWARMS. 



now MliS. AXTELL M.VNAGES. 



EAR FRIEND ROOT:— I want to tell your 

 readers, especially the ladies who don't like 

 to and can't well climb trees for bees, what a 

 nice and convenient arrangement a mos- 

 quito-bar tent (referred to before in Glean- 

 is to bring- hack virgin swarms— even the 

 mosquito bar without the frame, as I have but one 

 frame, and I use several cloths, or; rather, several 

 tent-covers. 



When bees begin to swarm, even if half are out, I 

 set the tent over the hive; and if the bees are half 

 out, the remaining- ones make such a roaring that it 

 calls those on the wing back every time. When all 

 are out the hive that care to come, I lift the tent off 

 to one side and open the hive; cut out cells in 

 brood, etc. The bees outside of the tent and on the 

 wing swoop down on to the combs. When the hive 

 is closed I take off the netting by turning it wrong 

 side out, as many of the bees stick to the cloth, and 

 I shake them in front of the hive, and then the work 

 is done. 



If swarms from hives having clipped queens staj-t 

 to issue, and I have a swarm on the wing, 1 throw a 

 tent or tent-cover over the hive, and kneel down 

 close to the netting and look through and catch the 

 queen and cage her, letting the swarm come and 

 cluster on the tent-bars or to the projecting ends of 

 the cover of Ihe hive. 



I have always verj- much dreaded my virgrin 

 swarms, as I take nearly the whole care of one apia- 

 ry, numbering now 9.5 strong colonies andi^about 30 

 nuclei and weaker ones, and Mr. Axtell has the 

 care of the apiary looatei] near the timber, 4 miles 

 away. 1 feel very thankful for the tent arrange- 

 ment to catch the virgin swarms. I could not han- 

 dle beoB successfully, I fear, except the queens' 

 wings were clipped, though I feel confident we 

 sometimes lose a queen by doing po. One of those 

 queens you pent was a beauty, and was successfully 



