1888 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



203 



into selling it in large packages in bulk, and 

 our customers bottle it or put it into tum- 

 blers, as they choose ; but the candying is 

 still a detriment in our small retail trade. 

 To have it go off readily we have to keep 

 melting it as fast as it gets solid. Your box 

 of dime packages is especially handsome. We 

 will set it on the wagon and see how it goes 

 off. 



THE "WATER WE DRINK. 



SHOULD IT CONTAIN LIVING CRKATURESy 



K. ANDREW PARTRTDGE, Flushing-, Michi- 

 g-an, sends me, in a small vial of water, 

 some little white animals which he pumps 

 from his well, and wishes me to tell where 

 they coiiin from, and if they are g-ood to 

 drink. He requests a reply through Gleanings. 



I often receive such specimens; and, as well 

 water often shows these or similar specimens, the 

 matter is one of some general interest. The little 

 animals sent are very pretty. They are boat-shaped, 

 with a double tail, and two pairs of antenna'. 

 Strangest of all, they have but one eye— a big red 

 one right in the center of the head— hence the nam 3 

 Cyclops, from the old fabled g-iants whose single 

 eye was said to ornament the center of the forehead. 

 Those who have Webster's Unabridged Dictionary 

 will get a good idea of this animal, as it is well illus- 

 trated there under the name "Cyclops." These simple 

 little animals with their short legs and biting mouth- 

 organs are bi-sexual, or there are both males and 

 females. One curious feature is the habit of the 

 female of attaching her bright green or red eggs to 

 the outside of her body, which always interests my 

 students as they study these curious little boatmen 

 each summer. I have also had some shrimp-like 

 tetradecapods sent me from wells. These, except 

 from the number of legs (14), look very much like 

 shrimps. Species of spring-tails or bristle-tails 

 iPoduridcv) are also found sometimes in wells. 



In reply to Mr. P.'s question, " Are they good to 

 drink?" I think that, alone, it would take a large 

 number to slake thirst; but I do not suppose that 

 they are very harmful or dangerous. The worst 

 feature of the case is, their presence argues some 

 organic vegetable matter in the water; for either 

 these or their piey must subsist on organized plant- 

 food. That organic matter is not desirable in water, 

 is one of the a.\ioms of these days. Yet the fact 

 that the famous old well of my boyhood home, 

 whose water was so cold and simrkling, contained 

 not very rarely these water boatmen, and the fur- 

 ther fact that few families are so strong, vigorous, 

 and healthy as were we, makes me question If these 

 little wrigglers, when not too numerous, are par- 

 ticularly harmful. 1 should prefer to have my 

 drinking-water so free from organic vegetable mat- 

 ter that no animal could live in it. Vet the finding 

 of an occasional cycloi>8 would not keep me awake 

 nights. A. .J. Cook. 



Agricultural College, Mich. 



I am glad you have told us about these 

 things, friend Cook, for I have been afraid 

 that people might get to be over-fastidious 

 about the water they drink. I understand 

 that the ('roton water of the city of New 

 York contains quite a menagerie of micro- 

 scopic animalculae ; but may we therefore 

 decide that it is dangerous to drink it V I 



am greatly in favor, however, where it can 

 be done, of having water that contains 

 nothing or next to nothing of this kind ; and 

 the thought occurs to me, while thinking of 

 the old well of your boyhood home, is it not 

 possible that this organic matter comes 

 from surface water that filters into the well, 

 instead of l)eing in the water as it issues 

 from the rocky recesses of the earth V If I 

 am correct, the water that comes direct 

 from the cavity of a rock, or from a spring, 

 contains nothing of this kind. Now, while 

 I am trying to save space, as I advise the 

 rest of you, a thought occurs that I can not 

 quite keep to myself. When I commenced 

 paying my attentions to a certain young 

 lady, her father, wlio was a steady old 

 farmer, objected to me on the ground that I 

 was so changeable that I would never amount 

 to any thing. His objection did me good, 

 and in the meanwliile I set about getting 

 acquainted with the old gentleman. One 

 Thursday afternoon I went over to see the 

 young lady in question, and5 carried along a 

 large nice microscope that I had just pur- 

 chased. I knew of a stagnant pool near by, 

 and tliought I should find something inter- 

 esting; and these very cyclops which you 

 describe, with the aid of the microscope took 

 the old gentleman so by storm (for he was 

 an intense lover of nature,^although I did 

 not know it at tlie time) that he and I be- 

 came fast fiiends from thatS day onward. 

 The young lady enjoyed seeing her father so 

 mucli enraptured with the cyclops, about as 

 well as I did. Do you wonder that Ernest 

 and Huber take naturally to microscopes? 



MORE ABOUT ANNA QUILLIN. 



AND A REBUKE TO THE MOST OF US WHO THINK 

 WE HAVE A HARD TIME OF IT. 



R. ROOT:— After that little letter about 

 Anna Quillin was printed in Gleanings, 

 I received a good many letters asking 

 about her shells and Indian relics, wanting 

 to know where they could buy Indian 

 axes, mortar-bowls, etc. Then the letter was cop- 

 ied from Gleanings into the New York Trilnotc, 

 and for two weeks postals showered down on me, 

 asking where to get Indian relics. I wrote to Anna, 

 asking where she got hers, and she wrote the fol- 

 lowing, which I hope you will print, as it will save 

 all the readers of Gleanings from writing to me 

 on the subject. Her letter shows bo brave a spirit 

 that perhaps it will do some lazy grumbling mor- 

 tal good to read it, and, perhaps, may cheer some 

 one who thinks he has more to bear than anybody 

 else ever had. 



ANNA QUILLIN'S LETTER TO MRS. CHADDtJCK. 



My Dear Mrs. Chaddoclc—l am truly sorry that I 

 can not give any satisfactory answer in regard to 

 the Indian relics. I have relics from Texas, Virgin- 

 ia, Connecticut, Dakota, and Wyoming Territory; 

 but it would be useless for me to give the addresses 

 of the persons of whom I obtained them, as they 

 have disposed ol all they had. I tried to get more 

 for some friends, but could not. I have been want- 

 ing to write to you, but have not succeeded, and 

 am stealing the time to write this; for it is late at 

 night, and all the rest are in bed, and I know some 

 of them are asleep; for I hear them. 



I have been so rushed with work that my friends 

 say I do not take time to eat or sleep; but that is an 

 exaggeration, of course. I have had all the fancy- 

 work that I could do for the last three months, and 



