IS'fJ 



(;LKANIN(i?< IN UKEc;ULTURE 



883 



!(,<)((. Tlu' letter V lias the soiiiid of I. This 

 pnablos a pupil to learn t(» reuti it (luito well in 

 one lesson, while a foriMi:ner t'an learn ours only 

 by stiuiyiiiu a \vi)r(l at a liine. and that, too, hy 

 the helpni a teacher, ll is vi'ry uiuli'^iraliie to 

 eliant:(> the names in California, except in some 

 obsiMire instances. Why would its chief city 

 sound any better if oalhnl Saint {•'raiicis. or the 

 capital if spelled Sacrament".' San Hiiena Ven- 

 tura means (Jood Luck personilied int>i a saint: 

 San Jacinto means St. Hyacinth: San Diego 

 moans St. James, or Holy .Mm as some mif^ht 

 ■• Anglicize" it. The names in California. Xew 

 Mexico, and Ari/ona, for one who understands 

 Spanish, are almost as got)d as a book of travels 

 in those .States; and even in English, how much 

 is contained in such words as (iood Hope. Cape 

 Desolation, Cape Farewell. Iceland. (Jreenlaiid, 

 <^tc. ! A very valuable feature could be added 

 to our schools by teaching the pupils to pro- 

 nounce the names found in foreign countries. 

 Some of them look hard, and can not be pro- 

 nounced with our alphabet; but by knowing 

 how, the words become as soft and musical as — 

 Cowhanger. for instance. Let the old luimes 

 found in the I'nited States remain as they are. 

 to show how the nations of the earth have 

 brought their treasures into it. The Spanish 

 have left an air of romance in that part of our 

 land which they settled, and it seems too bad to 

 dispel that romance by the introduction of our 

 everlasting "centers."' "villes." "burys."' etc. 

 The English language grows fat by browsing 

 on all others. 



CARDINAL FLOWER. 



PROF. COOK IJEI'LIES TO W. K. Gori-D .*< CIIITICIS.M 

 OX I'AGK 800. 



1 am glad that Mi'. (Jon Id has corrected ine in 

 the matter of the cardinal f1ow<r. From the re- 

 ports I had. I supposed there could b(; no ques- 

 tion but that the bees did secure honey from it. 

 I did not see, from the data which 1 received 

 from api)arently the most, reliable authority, 

 that there could be any doubt. and so I wrote as 

 I did. 1 am satisfied that Mr. Gould is correct, 

 and I take his reproof very kindly. We should 

 be very careful. befor.» we generalize, that our 

 facts (tre facts. The best of men make mis- 

 takes, and I shall be more than ever careful 

 henceforth that reported facts are genuine. 

 Again I thank Mr. fJould. 



0.\K-GAr,I>.S, OK OAK-APPLES. 



Mr. Allen Bartow, Milan. O.. sends me sever- 

 al oak-galls, and the gall-Hies which cause 

 them. He says that the insects are very ninv 

 and singular to him. Jle requests that I e.\- 

 plain their life economy through Gleanings. 

 The four-winged gall-flies belong to the same 

 great order of insects that contains our bees — 

 the Hyincnojitcid. They belong to the gall-fly 

 family, or Cyuiiiuht'. The cynips are usually 

 black, short, four-winged flies, with a very ob- 

 tuse abdomen. This looks as if it had "been 

 pushed up from behind, and is like that of the 

 bees, wasps, ants, and parasitic hymenoptera. in 

 that it ends in a sting, or ovii)ositor. As tliese 

 flies lay their eggs they irritate the leaf or stem, 

 and this causes an extra How of sap to the 

 place, and the result is excessive growth, or the 

 galls, which are familiar to all. These galls 

 surround the eggs, or larv;e after the eggs 

 hatch, and thus the gall serves both a-^ home 

 aiid food for the immature or larval gall-lly. 

 We may say that toe gall is simply increased 

 growth. If the stem or leaf is hairy, the gall 

 veil! very likely be spinous. Some of the galls 

 are very smooth and beaiiti ful. They are found 

 mostly on oak-trees, though not exclusively, as 



the rose cynip infests the rose-bush, and causes 

 galls on it. Odd as it seems, each Hy produces 

 a peculiar gall, so that the galls are as distinct- 

 ive as are the Hies that i)roduce them. Why 

 the irritating i)uncliire of one Hy should produce 

 one kind of gall, and that of anf;ther something 

 ililVerent, is not easily ex|jlained. May be the 

 |)oison differs in quality or quantity, and possi- 

 bly the wound may vary in extent, and so con- 

 trol the size and character of the gall. We oft- 

 en raise not only llui gall-Hies from the galls, 

 but also guest-flies. In this case a sort of tramp 

 Hy takes advantage of the gall and lays its eggs 

 in it. and its young also feeds on the gall. These 

 guest-Hies are nearly as numerous as are the 

 gall-Hies. Sometimes the; males are in different 

 kinds of galls from the females. In many cases 

 no males have been foiuid. It may be that 

 some of these species are parthenogenetic, like 

 plant-lice and our drone-bees — produced with- 

 out males and sperm-cells. It is easy to secure 

 the gall-flies. The only precaution is. not to 

 pick the galls from the tree till the larv;e are 

 mature, else the galls will dry up and the lar- 

 val gall-Hies will starve. 



WALKIN(;-STIf'KS. 



I have receiv(>d some walking-sticks from Mr. 

 C. L. Parker, Mentone. Ala. These are well 

 named, as they look like sticks with stick-like 

 legs. W(! have one in the north— Did iiperome- 

 ra feinorata — which is green when young, and 

 brown when mature. I was specially glad to 

 receive these from Mr. Parker, as they were 

 new to our collection. I am not sure of the spe- 

 cies, but I think it may be ^47ii.so/;(n;7>/(() hu- 

 prestokles. The male is very much smaller 

 than the female. They were mating as I took 

 them from the box in which they came. There 

 were also eggs in the box. They live on leaves 

 and twigs, which they so closely mimic that it 

 is hard to Hnd them. They feed on the foliage, 

 but are rarely so abundant as to do serious 

 harm. They drop their eggs from the trees in 

 which they dwell, and. when very abundant, 

 the dropping eggs make one think of a rain or 

 hail storm. They belong to the same order of 

 insects that contains the crickets, locusts, and 

 grasshoppers. A. J. Cook. 



Agricultural College. 



THAT SLUMGUM. 



SOME INTERESTING EXPERIMENTS WITH THE SO- 

 LAR wax-extractor; how to get ali> of 



THE WAX OUT OF THE SLUMGLT.M. 



I read with interest H. R. Boardman's article 

 on p. 77L also the offer you make in your foot- 

 note. I want you to make your test thorough. 

 Surely much wax remains in the refuse; when it 

 mak(!S so good a (ire. Sometimes, however, its 

 burning quality might come from propolis, 

 which is almost ecjual to wax foi fuel. 



Last spring we had a lot of stock to transfer, 

 both with and without frames; also a like lot 

 of hives in which the bees winter-killed. In all 

 these the honey was from one-fourth to three- 

 fourths candied. Nearly all of them were old 

 combs, some very old, and many with pjollen. 

 Then the query was. how to get this separated 

 into feed honey, wax, and slumgum. We could 

 not feed the honey by letting the bees caiTy it 

 out of the combs, for they would waste the bulk 

 of the candied honey by "■ kicking it out of 

 doors." The honey thus wasted would be worth 

 mon; than the combs or wax. To render by 

 sU'am or water applied directly would waste 

 much honey; so dry heat, by mt^ans of the solar 

 wax-extractor, seemed the best way to do it. 



My heart was set on having a jumbo solar 



