JANUARY 15, 1916 



59 



i'art of TainagaAva's ai-iiary. 



twelve j-ears of age, remarked to the other 

 children, " Malihini," and at the same time 

 indicated me. It was a simple tiling, per- 

 haps, yet I had been classified, identified, 

 and named. 



The city is a mass of vegetation; but 

 most of the trees are old friends, and al- 

 most all of them are trees that were im- 

 ported here. The royal palm is everywhere, 

 perhaps not quite as beautiful as in Cuba ; 

 then there is the royal ponciana, the mango, 

 the monkey-pod, and the algaroba. The 

 last is the most common tree in the city. 

 The first algaroba was brought to the island 

 of Oahu by Father Bachelot in 1826. The 

 original tree is still alive, and is to be found 

 on Fort Street near Beretania. For the 

 benefit of the Texas and New Mexico bee- 

 keepers I will state that the algaroba is 

 nothing more nor less than their old friend 

 mesquite. 



The first apiary, or, for that matter, tlie 

 first colony of bees that I saw after my 

 arrival at Honolulu, was the apiary of L. 

 Tamagawa, at Diam.ond Head. I had tak- 

 en the Waikiki Street car to the end of the 

 car line, and had then started to walk 

 around Diamond Head. This is the crater 

 of an extinct volcano. It is about seven or 

 eight hundred feet high, and its base on one 

 side is in the ocean. After leaving the 

 street-car I had walked about two blocks 

 when I heard the hum of bees; and, looking 

 over the fence to my left, T saw an apiary 

 of some seventy colonies of bees on the base 

 of the crater. 



I at once lost interest in my contemplated 

 walk around Diamond Head, and went in to 

 investigate the apiary. • It proved to be the 

 apiary of L. Tamagawa, a Japanese. He 

 is an energetic fellow about thirty-five years 

 of age. He was born in Japan, and came 

 to the Hawaiian Islands when a boy. He 

 has been an apiarist for some four years, 

 having purchased his apiary from another 

 Japanese who was returning to Japan. 



He showed me a copy of the 1913 edition 

 of the ABC, and seemed very proud of its 

 possession. He admitted, however, that he 

 found it very hard to read and understand. 

 The reason is, I suppose, that he was not 

 familiar with any Japanese words that are 

 the equivalent of the English apicultural 

 terms. Then, too, I noticed that he appear- 

 ed to be better able to understand writing 

 in Japanese than English, as he kept all his 

 accounts in that language. Even the rec- 

 ords or notations on his hives were in Jap- 

 anese, and I had quite an intei'esting time 

 having him translate into English what the 

 Japanese characters meant that I found on 

 the liives. His records, while crude, still 

 showed every indication 4hat he had a good 

 knowledge of the elements of practical bee 

 culture. 



One matter that does not bother Tamaga- 

 wa is keeping down grass and weeds in his 

 apiary. The particular place where the bees 

 are located is composed of volcanic ash of 

 sucli a nature that grass and weeds are 

 unable to obtain a foothold or nutriment. 

 The only i)lant that seemed to be able to 



