GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



85 



that comb, with a penknife, which could 

 have been done in less than a minute, would 

 have saved the colony. He said he had 

 noticed by some of the journals, that such 

 winter entrances are not necessary ; but 

 the writer who said that, probably referred 

 to L. frames, or something still shallower, 

 whereas his combs were nearly a foot deep ; 

 and as they were made on foundation, there 

 was not a hole left for a bee to creep through. 

 When the matter was presented to the con- 

 vention, although we asked a good many 

 questions no one present could tell why the 

 bees should die. But a moment's glimpse 

 made it as plain as day. JSow, I think it 

 will often prove to be like this where foul 

 brood starts out apparently of itself. 



THE VENTILATION OF SMALL BUILD- 

 INGS. 



DR. MII-LKR SCOLDS SOMEWHAT ABOUT THE EX- 

 ISTING STATE OF AFFAIRS. 



'ILL you bear a word more on this subject? 

 1 remember once hearing a man at an edu- 

 cational meeting say, " What would you 

 think, if you were seated at a dinner-table, 

 and a cup of water were handed to a 

 guest, who took the water in his mouth, then eject- 

 ed it back into the cup and passed it to his neigh- 

 bor, who did the same thing, and so on, till it made 

 the round of the table? And yet, very much the 

 same thing is constantly being done in our 

 churches, schoolhouses, and dwellings. The air is 

 loaded with the filthy exhalations of hundreds of 

 lungs, some of them far gone toward decay, and 

 yet you are forced to breathe it over and over 

 again." I thought it disgusting talk, but was 

 obliged to confess that the man had truth on his 

 side. 



Friend Hoot, the next time you go to church 1 

 wish you would watch the sexton. During the ser- 

 vice it is likely some of the windows have been 

 opened more or less for purposes of ventilation, 

 —no, hardly that, for very few people think of ven- 

 tilation for its own sake, but because the room was 

 getting too warm. Now, just the minute service is 

 over, watch that sexton. He'll shut every last one 

 of those windows as tight as he can make them. 

 His idea seems to be that the room is filled with a 

 sort of sanctified air, to preserve which requires 

 his most active energies. 



The same thing occurs in schoolrooms. Go into 

 one of the little country schoolhouses, venerable 

 with years of service, some hot day in summer, 

 when it has been unused for weeks, and kept tight- 

 ly closed. It just tttitihs, Q'here's no other word 

 for it. What can possibly give it such an all-per- 

 vading, enduring perfume? I'll tell you. For 

 manj- years, during several months of each year, 

 day after day, that room has been filled with air, 

 foul with the exhalations from many lungs, also 

 from the skins of dirty little urchins, some of 

 whom have been scarcely washeii since the week of 

 their birth. As soon as the day's session is over, 

 this air is bottled up tight, so that the heat of the 

 I'oom may not be lost. The dead and decaying par- 

 ticles of matter, not unmixed with the seeds of 

 scrofula and consumption, that have been thrown 

 off from the skin and lungs, settle in the walls and 

 furniture, to be breathed over again and added to, 



the next time the room is heated up., The poor ig- 

 norant teacher (and on this point nearly all Our 

 teachers are densely ignorant) thinks ventilation a 

 matter of secondary importance, if she can only 

 keep her cheLige warm enough. But I would rath- 

 er have her attempt to freeze my children than to 

 poison them. They can do something to resist the 

 freezing process by squirming about in their seats 

 and having a good romp at recess; but against the 

 slow but sure poisoning by foul air which they 

 must breathe, they are perfectly helpless. 



Well, what is to be done? I can tell some things 

 that can be done. At recess, let every window l>e 

 open at top and bottom; let the door be opened too, 

 if there is aa outside door. The air of the room 

 being heated, the cold air wilt rush in at the bottom 

 of the windows, and the bad air out at the top, un- 

 less there is wind enough to blow right through the 

 room. In a very few minutes the air of the room 

 is pure and sweet, when the windows can be closed, 

 and, with a good fire, the room will soon be com- 

 fortable, and it i» much easier to keep warm in pure 

 than in foul air. Stick a pin there. " But that will 

 take moi-e fuel." Of course, it will; but do you 

 want to save fuel at the expense of your child's 

 health and perhaps its life ? " But the children 

 who are sitting in their seats will take cold with the 

 windows open." They have no business sitting in 

 their seats at recess. If they can not be outdoors on 

 account of stormy weather, they should be set to 

 marching about the room, and I'll risk their taking 

 cold. Let the room be aired out the same way im- 

 mediately upon dismissing school, both forenoon 

 and afternoon; and if the day is still, some pro- 

 vision should probably be made for the entrance of 

 pure air during the sessions.- 



Instruct the sexton of your church so that he 

 will thoroughly air out the room the minute the 

 audience leaves the room, no matter if it does de- 

 lay him a few minutes; for at that time the misera- 

 ble air is anxious to get outdoors. See to it that, 

 in some way, fhere is a chance for the ingre.s8 of 

 pure air during the services, and don't make the 

 poor minister strive in vain to get a good sermon 

 into the half-sleepy heads and hearts of his hear- 

 ers. 



Now I have told you the truth, but I am not very 

 hopeful that it will make any difference. Well, if 

 you will go on breathing, and obliging the poor in- 

 nocent children to breathe such dirty, vile, poison- 

 ous, filthy, rotten, nasty, polluted air, I can't help 

 it. I wash my hands of the whole affair. 



Marengo, 111. C. C. Miller. 



Old friend, why do you say you are not 

 hopeful that it will make any difference V 

 Quite a lot of us are already hard at work, 

 looking after this matter of ventilating pub- 

 lic buildings. You ought to have seen Dr. 

 Mason and some of the rest of us insist on 

 the ventilation of our convention room at 

 Columbus. As there was an open grate in 

 the room, we managed to have real scien- 

 tific ventilation ; but, my good friend, there 

 is such a thing as going to extremes, even in 

 this matter. \Vith a temperature approach- 

 ing zero, one might bear, for the time being, 

 a room that is tolerably close, better than 

 to take a cold that may stand by him for 

 months, or possibly cost him his life, 1 

 agree with you, that more people die from 

 lack of air. as a rule, than from too much of 



