AUGUST 15, 1914 



649 



OUM HOME 



Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do 

 good to them that hate you, and pray for them which 

 despitefully use you and persecute you. — Matt. 5 ;44. 



AN ADDRESS DELIVERED BEFORE THE OHIO 



STATE beekeepers' ASSOCIATION ON 



FIELD DAY, JULY 9, 1914. 



Continued from previous issue. 



About five miles out in the country from 

 Medina was an old gentleman who had kept 

 bees nearly all his life in box hives; and I 

 think that at the time of my experiments 

 he had forty or fifty colonies, perhaps more. 

 I knew him by reputation, but not person- 

 ally. He was generally regarded as author- 

 ity on bee culture; but as he had only box 

 hives I had never paid him a visit. After 

 my statement came out in the Medina Ga- 

 zette, of getting a barrel of honey from a 

 single colony, somebody told me that Mr. 

 Chase said this was an utter impossibility. 

 Not long after, I saw him passing along the 

 street. I went out and accosted him as 

 follows : 



" Mr. Chase, is it really true that you 

 have been saying hard things about me and 

 my new Italian bees ? " 



" Yes, Mr. Root, I have said some rather 

 severe things, and my conscience has been 

 troubling me a little. What you have said 

 seems to me like an utter impossibility." 



I did not stop to arg-ue the matter. I 

 simply said : 



" Have you a little time to spare this 

 morning? " 



When he replied that he ought to get back 

 home I insisted tliat he accompany me to the 

 apiary. At the time, I had a hive of my 

 best Italians suspended by a spring scale 

 with a large plain dial that recorded ounces. 

 I brought out an easy-chair, placed it before 

 the hive, and said : 



" Mr. Chase, instead of answering you 

 myself I prefer to let the bees answer. Sit 

 down and watch that scale. I can bring you 

 a newspaper if you wish. But every now 

 and then I want you to watch that hand on 

 the dial." 



Then I left him. In a little while I came 

 back. 



" Why, Mr. Root, do you really mean to 

 say that those bees have brought in several 

 ounces of honey while I have been sitting 

 here?" 



It was just the time of day when honey 

 and pollen were coming in with a rush, 

 and I made my point. He took off his 

 hat and made a full apology, remarking that 

 he was old enough to have learned by expe- 

 rience that it is best to inform ourselves 



before rejecting new things. A little later he 

 came down while we were extracting from a 

 certain hive. I told him how many pounds 

 we had secured with my new home-made 

 all-metal honey-extractor — the first the 

 vorld had ever seen. Our German friends 

 have the credit of inventing the extractor; 

 but theirs but a clumsy machine made of 

 wood. I said right off it should be all metal. 

 Well, Mr. Chase did not say very much, but 

 he came into my store a week or ten days 

 later and said : 



" Mr. Root, will you have the kindness to 

 do me a favor? " 



Of course I responded with alacrity. He 

 then said : 



" I want to see that hive once more that 

 you robbed of almost every drop of its 

 honey." 



I told him it. was about ready to extract 

 again, and that I should be very glad to 

 have him see it. When he saw the same 

 combs of a two-story hive filled and sealed 

 over with a larger j^ield of honey than we 

 took out the first time, his astonishment was 

 complete. Said he: 



" Mr. Root, when I saw you take all that 

 honey out of the brood-nest as well as out 

 of the upper story, I told my friends the 

 colony would surely starve before winter." 



During that first season the colony on 

 spring scales during three days gathered 42 

 lbs. of honey. I have often wondered why 

 more beekeepers do not have a colony sus- 

 pended in that way. 



At that time, I made a statement that the 

 time would come when honey would not 

 only be on sale in every corner grocery in 

 our land, but that, like butter and eggs, it 

 would be on sale every day in the year. 

 Just a few days ago one of my sons-in-law 

 said to me: 



" Father, we have just got an order for 

 50 gross of these new individual bottles 

 of honey from a hotel in the city of New 

 York. They are using about one gross a 

 day." 



I expressed great surprise, and repeated 

 it around among my friends. A day or two 

 afterward he said : 



" Father, you thought it was a big thing 

 when we got one order for 50 gross of the 

 little jars of honey. Well, to-day we have 

 still another order, for four hundred gross." 



It is a little singular that Langstroth and 

 Quinby, each without the knowledge of the 

 other, got out a book on bees in 1853. 

 Langstroth described his new invention of a 

 movable-comb hive. Quinby's book was 



