1904 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



989 



Also allow me to add how very much interested I have 

 been in each and every article you have written con- 

 cerninR- automobiles, and I hope you will write many 

 more on the same subject. I thin); Mr. Terry is mistak- 

 en when he says. " We farmers furnish the land and 

 keep up the roads," at least that would not be exactly 

 true of this State, as here the county owns the roads 

 and expends the road taxes paid by every property- 

 holder in the county, farmers included, on these roads. 

 And in the first instance, the land taken up by the 

 roads have been boURht from each farmer when they 

 were originally made, and he does not own that land 

 any more, and can not raise crops on it nor run any 

 fence across it, both of which he would surely be entitl- 

 ed to do did he own it. 



Muses Bottom, W. Va. L. S. Rawi,inson. 



While the above is putting it in a much 

 shorter period than I would have done, I 

 think the writer is pretty nearly right if 

 not entirely so; and is it not a fact that it is 

 just now dawning upon this great world of 

 ours that horses may be educated to an ex- 

 tent that we have heretofore little dreamed 

 of? See reports from across the ocean, and 

 afso exhibitions at the St. Louis exposition. 



SOMETHING FROM "THE HORSE'S STAND- 

 POINT." 



Mr. Root:— We ai-e much interested in your articles on 

 automobiles. I wonder a little that nothing is ever 

 written from the horse's standpoint. Does any one stop 

 to think that the average horse has a rather hard time 

 of it, and that great numbers of them have a very hard 

 time? We live 20 miles from a railroad, and keep a 

 horse: but I rejoice at each new indication that the auto 

 is coming. A number of stages go in and out of this 

 place each day. Teams of four or six horses are con- 

 stantly going and coming with freight. The crack of 

 the big whip is a common sound. All have mountains 

 to climb. Often the driver does not use good judgment 

 in handling his teams, and the strain comes doubly hard 

 on some. 



Throughout this State during the dry season, another 

 gi-eat army of people are traveling. These are the 

 campers. Among them, also, are many jaded ill-fed 

 horses. They usually carry a heavy load of bedding, 

 cooking-utensils, etc. I look at the weary horses, and 

 rejoice to think that some day the automobile will re- 

 lieve them. One who has never been in the mountains 

 can not i-ealize what climbing vyith loads is for horses. 



Lakeport, Cal., Sept. 26. L. W. Densmore. 



Many thanks, my good friend, for having 

 put in a plea for better treatment for horses. 

 If the advent of the automobile should re- 

 lieve in even a small degree the horse as a 

 beast of burden, I should rejoice. I have 

 all my life (many times on these pages) 

 protested against cruelty to and overloading 

 the poor horses. If the automobile is going 

 to bear the heavy burdens, and let the horses 

 do the lighter work, and become more a com- 

 panion to man rather than an abject slave, 

 tortured and cruelly used at that, then we 

 can rejoice. It is not uncommon to find 

 horses that have more intelligence and good 

 judgment in their line of work than the 

 beast (in man's image) that drives and 

 abuses them. On page 898, Sept. 15, one of 

 the writers uses the expression, "your 

 sweet-tempered Mrs. Root." I took the 

 letter over and read it to her before it was 

 put into print, and you should have heard 

 her ringing laugh when she heard herself 

 called "sweet-tempered." I think I shall 

 have to confess that I put it in print with- 

 out her permission; and when she saw it she 

 was not exactly "sweet-tempered." She 

 said in substance, it is not true; it never 

 was true, and she feared it never would be 



true. Notwithstanding the above, I have 

 my own opinion in regard to the matter. 

 May be I am biased a little in her favor. 

 But this is true: Whenever she sees a 

 drunken man (or any other brute) beating a 

 horse that is doing its very best, she is like- 

 ly to show a peculiar trait that the world 

 might not call "sweet-tempered." If a 

 man wants to get mad at his auto, and 

 abuse it while he is on a drunken spree, 

 none of God's creatures are made to suffer. 

 If he overtaxes it or abuses it in any way 

 while he is in a fury, he must pay the pen- 

 alty out of his own pocket. 



LONG - RANGE WEATHER - PREDICTIONS, OR 



TELLING WHAT THE WEATHER WILL BE 



FOR A YEAR IN ADVANCE. 



I feel it my duty to keep bringing this 

 matter up so long as there are people who 

 quote the fake weather-prophets. The fol- 

 lowing extract is from a recent issue of the 

 Cleveland Leader: 



" I will go on record with the statement that it is im- 

 possible to forecast the weather of ten successive days for 

 a given locality on scientific principles. Any one pre- 

 tending to do so is a humbug in the fullest sense of the 

 word, and can be proved so in every instance." 



The statement quoted above was made yesterday by 

 Father Odenbach, of St. Ignatius* College, who, witli 

 Forecaster Kenealy, has just returned from the third 

 convention of Weather Bureau officials held at Peoria, 

 111., last week under the authority of the Secretary of 

 Agriculture. 



Father Odenbach, who is recognized as one of the 

 country's greatest experts on meteorological subjects, 

 also attended the convention of the officials held three 

 years ago at Milwaukee. Such statements as " There 

 will be storms in the period of the 20th to the 27th of 

 September," without mentioning a special day or desig- 

 nating a single State, to say nothing of a county or a 

 single city, are easily made, and any schoolboy has a 

 formula by which he may give the percentage of possi- 

 bilities for guessing correctly. It is guessing, and 

 nothing more. It is unpardonable in a modern news- 

 paper to cram its pages with lies, nonsense, and pi-o- 

 ductions of ignorant, eccentric, or dishonest fakers. To 

 give them a chance is a menace to the public and a cry- 

 ing injustice to a set of men that are the pride of the 

 intellectual portion of the American people command- 

 ing the highest esteem of European scientists of all 

 nationalities. We Americans pride ourselves on the 

 strength of our scientific schools and intellectual ad- 

 vances generally. The weather-prophet fad is certain- 

 ly a manifestation in the contrary direction. Any man 

 talking seriously of these quacks is set down in my 

 mind as deplorably ignorant, at least as regards meteor- 

 ological science. The same may be said for the char- 

 latans themselves, though I would give them the alter- 

 native of being ignorant or dishonest. 



I might mention here that the Weather 

 Bureau has published quite a good-sized book 

 or pamphlet giving an account of the most 

 careful observations made for years past, 

 and all over the world, to determine whether 

 our moon or any of the planets affect the 

 weather. The decision is most emphatic, 

 and you can set it down that the man who 

 attempts to tell you the moon has any in- 

 fluence whatever on the weather is either 

 ignorant or dishonest. I can forgive him 

 for being ignorant; but the dishonest man 

 who robs the people of their hard earnings 

 by his almanac should be relegated to the 

 place where all liars will some time congre- 

 gate. 



See the last paragraph in my extract 

 above. 



