18,S1 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTUBE. 



465 



Labels within 2i hours after the order is received 

 seems to be a welcome noveltj-, and many are the 

 kind words we have received from our customers in 

 regard to them. Such a trade has sprung up sud- 

 denly in them, that we have once or twice been de- 

 layed a little on label paper. Our friend "M." has 

 charge of the department now, and you may feel, 

 when you send an order, that jou are helping one 

 who is fighting his way towaid heaven. His wife 

 works at a case by his tide, on Our Homes, Part 

 Second, which will doubtless be out in a month or 

 two. 



In the dillicult and perplexing matters that come 

 up in regfird to what is right or wrong, I can only 

 promise you to lie governed by the dictates of what 

 my conscience tells me to do; and if my course 

 seems to you inconsislcnt, I do not very well see 

 how I can help it. If it were only the needs of a 

 single individual that I was obliged to consider, it 

 would often be a very simple thing to decide on, 

 compared to what it is iiow. Intimating that I am 

 not a Christian, unless I act as you tbink I should, 

 will not help jour cause; and I pray to God that it 

 may not make me stubborn. I do not mean to say 

 by the above that I do not want friendly counsel, for 

 I need it now perhaps more than lever did before. 



It has happened several times this season that 

 same one would order bees, and, after receiving them 

 all dead, they would conclude they did not wany any, 

 and order the money returned. So far as I know, 

 the money has always been returned; but, my 

 friends, after one has done the best he could, and 

 had such a loss, is he not entitled to the privilege of 

 trying again? Turn it around both ways, and see 

 how j/iH would like it. If the order is delayed until 

 the honey season is passed, this makes another 

 thing of it ; bvit suppose one orders bees or queens, 

 and the shipment goes promptly, but they come 

 through dead, is he not entitled to the privilege of 

 replacing them? How would you like to send off a 

 colony of your best bees, prepared with great pains 

 and troublvj, and receive no sort of equivalent to 

 cover your loss? It is ^"e^J' seldom indeed that two 

 successive shipments fail, so the shipper, after send- 

 ing the feecond lot, receives half price for his goods, 

 and the prices on bees and queens are necessarily so 

 high that half price is not a dead loss. 



the mails, or have any possible chance of handling 

 them, except educated, cultured, and intelligent 

 clerks, who are as much above suspicion as ymt put- 

 .si'/z/y can hr, friend F. Every reader of Gle.\nings 

 knows how 1 have borne these burdens for you all, 

 until the chief of the P. O. D. protested against my 

 doing so any more, as you will see by our price list. 



The following is said to have been passed as a law, 

 by the State of Michigan. 



No person shall mi.xany glucose or grape sugar in- 

 tended for human food, or any oleomargarine, suine, 

 beef fat, lard, or any other foreign substance, with 

 any butter or cheese intended for human food, or 

 shall mix or niinale any glucose or grape sugar or 

 oleomargarine with any article of food, without dis- 

 tinctly marking, stiimping, or labeling the article, 

 or package containing the same, with the true and 

 appropriate name of such article, and the percent- 

 age in which glucose or grape sugar, oleomargarine 

 or suine, enters into its composition; nor shall any 

 person sell, or offer for sale, or order, or permit to be 

 sold, or offered for sale, any such article of food, in- 

 to the composition of which glucose or grape sugar 

 or oleomargarine or suine has entered, without at 

 the same time informing the buyer of the fact, and 

 the proportions in which such glucose or grape su- 

 gar, oleomargaine or suine, has entered into its com- 

 position. 



Any person convicted of violatingany provision of 

 any of the foregoing sections of this act shall, for the 

 first offf use, be fined not less than ten dollars nor 

 more than fifty dollars. For the second offense they 

 shall be fined not less than twenty-tive dollars nor 

 more than one hundred dollars, fir confined in the 

 county .iail not less than one month nor more than 

 six months, or both, at the discretion of the court ; 

 and for the third ami all subsequent offenses the.v 

 shall be fined not less than two hundred and not 

 more than one thousand dollai-s, and imprisonment 

 in the State prison not less than one year nor more 

 than five years. 



Good for Michigan ; and may her citizens see that 

 the above is enforced to the very letter, no matter 

 whom it hits. 



SENDING MONEY BY MAIL WITHOUT REUISTERING. 



My friends, it seems to me as if I was having an 

 unusual number of burdens to bear this fall, and 

 one of the hardest of them to bear patiently, is let- 

 ters like the following:— 



Lansingvili.K, N. Y , Aug. 10. 1881. 

 I have sent you the nay for tlio.-^f plyers twice, and do not 

 think it light lor me to fiay again I think the letters both 

 reached tlieir destination, or I would have received them baek 

 through tlie Dead-Letter tlftiee. D. W. Fletchkii. 



Friend F., ,vou surely know that mails are some- 

 times burned up, to say nothing of robberies. Every 

 once in a while we get a letter from the department 

 like the following, which came almost at the same 

 time of your complaint: — 



POSTOFFl(-'E UKI'ARTMEN'T, / 



t)FFICE OF TniRD ASSISTANT I'oSTM.l.STEU (iENEKAI,, 



Division of Dkah Letters. I 



The enclosed letter was I'ouiul with the contents of a mail 

 ~ pouch stolen and litlecl at Milford Centre, Ohio. April 2:i, ISSl. 



Now, friend r.,have you any right to say yoa thinh 

 the money reached Medina, just because it don't 

 come back from the Dead-Letter Office? I had just 

 about as soon you would say you think I have stolen 

 it, as to say you think my clerks did. None handle 



QUEENS THAT WON'T LAY. 



I HAVE many times told you, that once in a while a 

 queen would refuse to lay after a trip through the 

 mails. I wish the friends would remember this 

 when inclined to be uncharitable with each other. 

 See the following:— 



Your Holy-Land (lueen did not lay before the ilth day. Her 

 trii> here was not over a 2-ilays' one, and I don't believe she 

 was a fertile one when she left your apiai-y, which, if tiue. is 

 not fair work. S. W. .Morrison. 



Oxford, Chester Co., Pa.. Aug. G, 1881. 



T replied, remonstrating against such assertions, 

 which brought the following:— 



I did not say or Ihinlc von intentionally tent me a non-ferlile 

 Holy Land queen, but I do think such an accident might happen 

 occasionally, or some whom yon employ might do such a thing 

 knowingly." as vou will admit. AVe are getting more hone.v 

 from re<l clover Uiis siasoii than we did from white. This 

 makes the li.uicv scasmi line a success. S. W. MouRISoX. 



Oxford, Chcsti-r ('.!., I'a . Aug. 12. 1881. 



But, friend M., I do nut admit that I have a hand 

 who handles bees who would send out a queen, un- 

 der any circumstances, before she had commenced 

 to laj'. We ha\'e always been in the habit of will- 

 ingly replacing all queens that refused to lay, or 

 everyone producing only drone eggs; but, please 

 do not make our burden harder, by intimations that 

 we are dishonest— (Hii/c/ w.s. As soonas friend Doolit- 

 tle advertised queens, I sen.tf or one raised under the 

 natural-swarming impulse; but, although she was a 

 three-dollar queen, she had not laid an egg when ten 

 days old. A few days more, and she was lost. Shall 

 I say, or even think, that ho sent me an unfertile for 

 a tested quTcn? Hil "" manner of means, for I laioit' 

 he did not. Would nan do such a thing, friend M., or 

 would you even keep in your employ a boy or man 

 who )7ii(/7if do it? 



