1891 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



747 



yoii the wages that I gave Bridget— two dollai's 

 a week." 



A flood of color came to Louis' face. 



•"To school!" he said, with shining eyes. 

 "Oh. it won't take lung to decide which I 

 choosel I never will lo^e coiu'age again; I will 

 always think that God will bring things right 

 at last. Only this morning that school looked 

 as far out of ray reach as the Kohinoor dia- 

 mond, and 1 did want it so much!'" 



•• ' When the tale of bricks is doubled. Moses 

 comes.' " Mrs. Marten said. •• I have faith in a 

 boy who will dig with a spoon when he can not 

 get a shovel, and I'm glad to help him. But 

 about the school, you must see what youi' moth- 

 er says. She may not agree with you. Stop a 

 minute." — for he had caught up his hat. " Tell 

 your niothe)' that I shall want you hei'e nights 

 to be ready for work iu the morning, but you 

 can run home every evening foi' a call, if you 

 choose. You have done Bridget's work to-day, 

 and some of a man's besides, and you may like 

 to take your pay home. Here it is." 



He looked at the silver she pushed toward 

 him. but did not put out his hand. 



'■ Have I earned that?" he asked doubtfully. 



"Why. certainly, you silly boyl It isn't 

 charity, if that is what you are afraid of," she 

 said, laughing. "It is your pay for to-day. 

 Didn't I tell you that you" had earned it?" 



He took it then, with thanks. 



The glow of pleasure was still on his face 

 when he reached home, and his mother greeted 

 him with, — 



" Successful at last, my boy, I'm sure!" 



"I knew it before 1 saw you." said Freda. 

 " You did not come slowly, slowly along the 

 road. You were walking fast, and I heard you 

 whistling "Yankee Doodle,' so I knew." 



•• Yes, I've got a place at last," he said. 



And now, friends, for the moi'al. Some of 

 you may ask, "Was there ever just such a 

 boy ? " or, perhaps, what is of more importance, 

 ''Are there any such boys nowitdmjsf-' Thank 

 God, there are both boys and girls, and men and 

 women of much the same stamp, although, per- 

 haps, the character in the story as given above 

 is somewhat an ideal one. I do not know that 

 I ever saw one single boy who possessed all 

 these virtues. I have seen, however, a gi-eat 

 many who possessed more or less of the same 

 virtues. How I shouhl love to tell you about 

 some of them ! But space (and the doctor) for- 

 bids. I would say this, however: I have been 

 among such people for more than forty years of 

 my life. I have seen them grow into important 

 positions, and positions of sacred trust. Per- 

 haps I should tell you that the hero of the sto- 

 ry above did work his way— yes, fought his 

 way, inch by inch at times, through the (icade- 

 my, next thi-ough college; and before he died he 

 was governor of t]i<f State in which he lived. 



And now for the moral, dear reader. It is 

 this: When you meet such a one, eager and 

 hungry for work, give him a chance. Give him 

 a brief trial, at least; and when the great and 

 final day shall come, then the Judge of all the 

 earth will say to you, " Come, ye blessed of my 

 Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you 

 from the foundation of the world. . . . For 

 I was a stranger" (and without work) " and ye 

 took me in." 



Be not forsetfu] to entertain strangers; for thereby some 

 have entertained angil> unawares — Hkb. l:i:2. 



This issue seems to be largely devoted to a 

 discussion of the advantages and disadvantages 

 of loose and fixed frames. Discussions on this 

 topic will be in oider for two or thi'ee issues 

 more. Now that there have been hundreds of 

 bee-keepers all over the land who have been 

 testing some form of lixed frame, it is fitting 

 that we compare notes and so avoid expensive 

 mistakes and blunders. In other words, we do 

 not want to get into that unhappy condition 

 spoken of by friend Doolittle. where a bee- 

 keeper wasted all his substance in useless ex- 

 perimenting. 



On page 728, current issue, J. A. Green doubts 

 the statement made by some, that the raking 

 motion on the part of the bees in front of tlieir 

 entrances is prognostic of swarming. We have 

 observed this scraping or raking, hundreds of 

 times, and it usually, with us. occurs some 

 thi-ee or four weeks after the honey season is 

 closed, and swarming ceased. Almost anv time 

 during the latter pait of July and all of August 

 we can find a good many of our colonies doing 

 this " washboard act:" and yet, so far as we 

 can discover, it means nothing. The bees at 

 the entrance evidently have nothing to do, and 

 think they must clean ott' the paint from the 

 alighting-board, as the paint to them is foreign. 



Our Shane yard, when bi'ought home, was 

 set out on the S. E. Miller plan (see page .534, 

 Gleanings for 1890. or the last edition of the A 

 B C), in groups of five each, so arranged that 

 there would be an alleyway for the bees and 

 one for the apiarist. It looked well to us in 

 the first place on paper, and it works well in 

 practice. As the hives in individual groups are 

 only 14 inches apart, there is a handy seat for 

 working over each hive, and the tools are with- 

 in easy range of tlie whole five hives. Where 

 apiaries are arranged with a single hive in a 

 location, there is a great deal of traveling from 

 hive to hive, and a lugging of all the tools. On 

 the plan of five in a group, lugging has to be 

 done only once for every five hives. 



A. I. ROOT, JUST BEFORE GOING TO PRESS. 



Weix, friends, I am in the office once more ; 

 but I do not stay very long, and do not go very 

 often. The doctor forbids it. I have to-day, 

 Sept. 1.5th, for thcf first time been down to the 

 creek- bottom garden. It seems wonderful that 

 so great changes could be made in the growing 

 season, in just a little over four weeks. Parker 

 Earle strawbei'ries, set out after my sickness 

 (with transplanting-tnbes).arenowgreatstrong 

 plants sending out vigoi-ous runners on either 

 side. American Peai'l onion-sets, planted at the 

 same time, are now several inches high, mak- 

 ing a pei-fect stand of long green rows. It seems 

 good to get around and look over this wonder- 

 ful world once more. But I have had a little 

 sad experience in the way of getting well too 

 fast; so, good -by for the present. 



LOOK OUT FOR HIM ! 



We received the letter below from friend Da- 

 dant some little time ago, as you will notice. 

 As it is always our custom to give even a rascal 

 a hearing, we wi-ote him at once, asking him 

 what he had to say for himself; but by some 

 carelessness of our own he was not promptly 



