1884 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTUEE. 



705 



dren, and told them what she wanted; and the ma- 

 tron brought In three of their most promising chil- 

 dren for Mrs. H. to see, and they stood up before 

 her, one aged 11, one 5, and one 3. She had just 

 made up her mind to take the " little one" when 

 the flve-year-old stepped up to her and said, " I likes 

 you, lady; I wants to go home wiz you; take me;" 

 and that was too much for Mrs. H.'s mother-heart, 

 and she took her. 



Mrs. H., in speaking about it, said, " I liked her 

 because she was such a neat little thing. I am 

 fleshy, and all my folks were, and so is Mr. H. and 

 all of his people, and we are always dieting to keep 

 down our flesh, and I thought it would be pleasant to 

 have some trim little body around; but, alas and 

 alas! she weighs 97 lbs., and, just look at her! the 

 boys in the street call her' Jumbo,' and 'Fat-legs.' 

 What shall I do? 



"We took her up stairs the first night, and put her 

 to sleep with Jessie ; and just as soon as she touched 

 the bed, and before I could get my hairpins out, 

 she was fast asleep and 8?iorin(7— and such snoring! 

 I don't care for katydids in general, nor for lambs 

 bleating; and I think a Mississippi steamer, with all 

 its racket, a splendid place to sleep; but Katy's 

 snoring was worse than any thing— such awful, 

 nerve-splitting noises— such spluttering and catch- 

 ing of breath ! then such a rushing forth of locomo- 

 tive puffs, then some sad notes, such as a rain crow 

 makes before a stoi-m; then great snorts and gasps, 

 that seemed as if they would tear the child's throat 

 to pieces, and all of them intermingled with catches 

 and gurgles that kept me thinking she would surely 

 choke to death. Then she would go on regular for 

 awhile, getting lower and lower down the scale, and 

 my hopes would begin to rise; but with a snort she 

 would start out afresh. I have read in newspapers 

 that if you turn a snoring person on his side he will 

 shut his mouth and stop. I thought I would try it 

 on Katy; but you might as well try to turn over a 

 broken egg with your fingers; as fast as I turned 

 her over she just flattened out the other way, till I 

 gave up in despair. And this is what Katy diJ— kept 

 me awake all night long, and quit even with them 

 in the morning." Mahala B. Chaddock. 



Vermont, 111. 



BEE-KEEPING IN MICHIGAN. 



WHAT A BOY OP 14 YEARS DID. 



fHE goods I bought of you last July, 148 lb., re- 

 tailing-case and 50 wooden separators, came 

 to hand in good shape, and I am well pleas- 

 ed \^ith them. 



I will give you a little history of my bee- 

 keeping. Two years ago I bought 3 colonies of hy- 

 brids in Imperial hives, and by the next fall I had 6 

 swarms and not quite 2 lbs. of surplus. Went into 

 winter quarters in Nov., 1883; wintered all safely 

 through. In the spring, one colony that I had just 

 transferred into the L. hive absconded, leaving me 5 

 to begin 1884, with 2 of them very weak. They 

 swarmed but once this summer, making me 6 to go 

 into winter quarters with this fall, the same as last 

 fall. I have taken off about 7-5 lbs. of surplus from 

 three colonies. About two weeks ago I received a 

 Holy -Land queen from Add Wood, Rives, Mich., 

 and introduced her successfully in the Peet cage. 

 Up to this time she has laid 3 or 4 Simplicity frames 

 full of eggs. 

 I could not get along at all keeping bees if I did 



not have the ABC book. I mean to take Glean- 

 ings if I can spare the money next year. 



I will tell you how I fixed those wooden separat- 

 ors. I took a strip of tin '4 inch wide, and cut it as 

 long as the separators are wide. Laying the sepa- 

 rators on the frames just right, then lay on the tin, 

 and nail through that, and it can't fall off. 



Clarence W. Bond, age 14. 



Jackson, Mich., Sept. L'8, 1884. 



^ « ^ 



THE BUG-HUNTEHS. 



A SHORT LESSON IN ENTOMOLOGY. 



HERE it is! catch it!" "Don't let it get 

 away!" "Take care!" "Let me!" "Oh 

 dear! it's gone!" " No, here it is again!" 

 "Now I have it!" And Minnie held her 

 scoop-net so that all could see the most 

 gorgeous butterfly they had caught yet— yellow and 

 gold and black, with its large wings spread out like 

 fans, and then away they all went to smother it 

 with ether, and mount it. 



Minnie is going to study " Bugology " next winter, 

 and she has been collecting specimens all summer. 

 At first she went out alone with an old straw hat 

 and a bottle of carbolic acid; but now she has the 

 other children, her papa, the hired hand, her uncle 

 James, and all the neighbors' children to help her, 

 and they have scoop-nets, made of old mosquito 

 netting and barrel-hoops, and the crawling, creep- 

 ing things, after being impaled alive on a pin, are 

 mercifully smothered with ether. They have cigar- 

 boxes to keep them in, and each individual bug or 

 jDcetle is mounted on a very thin slice of cork. 



They have two boxes of butterflies that are "just 

 lovely." Yesterday they showed them to a lady, 

 and she thought they were made of wax, like wax 

 flowers. They are arranged in groups, with the 

 colors shading off to the edges, or else the colors are 

 contrasted, so that a brilliant effect is produced, as 

 pleasing to the eye as the dyes of Eastern make, or 

 the work of the artist's brush. Every child can 

 make a collection; all that is needed is a pin and a 

 butterfly to start with ; and after the interest is once 

 aroused, all the other things will gather around un- 

 til a beautiful and useful collection will soon be 

 framed. Even the baby has caught the enthusiasm, 

 and every day he comes in with bugs and woi-ms 

 squashed up in his tightly shut chubby hands; and. 

 displaying his treasures, he says, " They are for Min- 

 nie's museerum." They have a box of cute little 

 snakes, with the curl in their tails just as natural as 

 life, and they have snake-feeders, and katydids and 

 katydidn'ts, over one hundred specimens in all. 

 Who of the Gleanings family of children will start 

 a museum right away? 



Mahala B. Chaddock. 

 Vermont, Fulton Co., Ills. 



Mrs. C, your lifelike sketch reminds me of 

 a visit I had with Prof. Cook. We went 

 across the country a piece to meet a bee- 

 friend, and on the way he would run and 

 grab for great uglv green worms and cater- 

 pillars, in a way that almost made me shiv- 

 er ; and then he put them into a tin box so 

 he could carry them in his pocket. It 

 seemed to me as if they would bite or sting ; 

 but he declares that neither spiders, bugs, 

 worms, nor caterpillars ever bite or sting. 

 Honey-bees and the wasps are the only kind 

 of insects to be feared in that way. I agree 



