472 



(^LEANINGS IK J3EE CULTURE. 



June 



tag's in natural swarming', and it is a perfect bother 

 any way you can fix it. E. Fkance. 



Father Langstroth is not only a religious Chris- 

 tian, but 50 years a minister of the gospel, and one 

 of the best souls, naturally, which I have ever met; 

 and, if I am not in error, he considers this hiving of 

 swarms on Sunday a necessity, so to speak, and ad- 

 vises such practice. James Heddon. 



" Stay at home and hive the bees." I know a bee- 

 keeper in a small Illinois town who keeps his bees on 

 a small lot, with plenty of near neighbors. He per- 

 sists In attending church during the swarming sea- 

 son. During the services the neighbors will call 

 him out; then all over the congregation there will 

 be smiling, and nudging of one another, and whis- 

 pering, " His bees arc swarming." The services 

 and the neighbors are disturbed. A minister came 

 to me, saying, " What shall 1 do with my bees Sun- 

 days? I will not let any of my family stay at home." 

 I told him, when he went to chui-ch to put up 

 queen-guards, and remove when he returned. He 

 had only five or six colonies. He did so, and lost 

 none. If stock breaks out of inclosures, such as 

 horses, cattle, or pigs, the owner cares for them. 

 Why not bees? We should use good common sense 

 in deciding questions i-elating to religious observ- 

 ances, as well as in other walks of life. 



Mrs. L. Harbison. 



It seems to me the heat way for the brother to get 

 the right answer to his question is to consult his 

 " guide-book " and go to the Being he is anxious to 

 please, with a pure heart and an acceptable service, 

 for direction, and he will not bo led astray. lam 

 quite sure that no one has any right to engage in 

 any business that necessitates the bi-eaking of the 

 Sabbath in its pursuit. " Remember the Sabbath 

 day, to keep it holy." 



This is my way: Keep all queens' wings clipped. 

 Place the hives si.t feet or more apart, with the 

 front on a 3x2-inch-8quare piece that lies on the 

 ground, so if they should swarm the queen can 

 crawl back when the swarm i-eturns. Being oblig- 

 ed to set the hives closer together this year, I am 

 raising them up so the queen can not crawl back. 

 A glance through the apiary, on returning from 

 church, will discover the queens, and tell which 

 colonies have swarmed, and the queen can be re- 

 turned. Dk. A. B. Mason. 



I think the time has come when we should con- 

 demn all Sunday bee-keeping or work with bees. 

 The gain spiritually, with a pi'oper observance of 

 the Sabbath, ought to abundantly compensate for a 

 small pecuniary loss, if there is any, but usually 

 the money loss is upon the other side. The man 

 above, wishes to do right, but at the same time 

 wants his own way about the bees swarming. He 

 doesn't want to know of any better way of manag- 

 ing bees, but assumes his way as best, and then 

 wants us to hel)) him out when his boat begins to 

 sink. If this man will set his hives close to the 

 ground, so the queens can crawl in when the swarm 

 returns (queens' wings clipped, of course), go to 

 church and not think of his bees, he will probably 

 gain more than he loses. Monday he can repair 

 damages; now and then a queen lost, now and then 

 a little mixing-up. I have always practiced artificial 

 increase, and have never worked with bees on Sun- 

 day. Those of your readers who profess to regard 

 the teachings of science more than revelation 

 should understand that science teaches that more 



and better work can be done in six than seven days 

 in the week, and that better health and longer life 

 is the result of a weekly rest-day. 



P. H. Et.WOOD. 



" Happy is he that condemneth not himself in 

 that thing which he alloweth."— Romans U: 22. I 

 think no iron-clad rule should be given in this case. 

 It is the privilege of every one who has committed 

 his life wholly 'to the Lord to have within him the 

 present influences of the guiding Spirit, assisting 

 him to decide correctly. 



Bees are stock; and God never forbade the prop- 

 er care of stock, even under the Jewish dispensa- 

 tion, still less under the Christian (Luke i;5:15; 

 Matt. 12:11). " Howbeit there is not in every man 

 this knowledge," and to satisfy the feelings of our 

 fellow-beings is sometimes of more importance 

 than a few swarms of bees. Getting a horse out of 

 a well into which he had fallen was allowed; and it 

 involves more work than caring for the swarms of 

 a large apiarj'. The alternative is the same in each 

 case— lose the horse— lose the bees. Those who 

 wish to befog the question, instead of clearing it 

 up, will at once inquire about the farmer's field of 

 hay that might get wet. Any candid heart can see 

 that there is a wide difference between providing 

 against a i)(i!<i<ible loss and providing against a cer- 

 tain loss. 



Seeking to do the will of God, as above, I have 

 often turned and walked awaj' from my apiary, 

 leaving swarms to goto the woods at pleasure. LBe 

 still, murmuring heart! down there! God has given 

 me so many bees that I shall hardly miss half a 

 dozen swarms.] At other times, when circum- 

 stances were different, I have spent nearly the 

 whole day in earnest work taking care of swarms. 

 Another way 1 have used a little is to instruct a 

 person loft at home how to sprinkle the clustered 

 swarms every half-hour with the fountain pump, 

 thus keeping them till my return. When only a 

 few swarms threaten, the di-one-trap would answer 

 I think. E. E. Hasty. 

 1^ I ^ 



ADVANTAGES OF A SQUARE FKAME. 



FRIEND nOOI.ITTLE CONTUASTS THE GALLUP 

 FKAME AND THE LANGSTROTH, ETC. 



HEN I first commenced to keep bees T 

 adopted the Langstroth frame, taking it 

 for granted that such was the best frame 

 foi- this locality, as apparently the largest 

 number of bee-keepers of that day were 

 using it, taking the countrs' throughout. At the 

 same time, I had a few box hives that were about 

 one foot square inside, which I intended to transfer 

 to Langstroth frames, as soon as swarming was 

 over. As the swarming season approached, T was 

 surprised to find that my bees in the square box 

 hives had increased much faster than those in the 

 shallow frame, and eventually cast swarms nearly 

 ten days in advance of them. At this 1 began to 

 look around to see if I could not find a frame 

 hive of nearly the shape of these box hives. Aft- 

 er considerable investigation I settled down on the 

 square form of frame as used by Elisha Gallup, 

 and since known as the Gallup frame, although it 

 is only the L. frame in a square form. I still used 

 the long shallow frame for one year after deciding 

 on the Gallup, to see if my conclusions were cor- 

 rect; and at the end of the season the advantages 

 of the sijuare frame became so convincing that I 

 discarded the shallow frame altogether. Later on 



