The Lancaster Farmer. 



Prof. S. S. EATHVON, Editor. 



LANCASTER, PA., OCTOBER, 1877. 



Vol. n. No. 10. 



FARMERS AND THEIR RELATIONS TO 

 THE COUNTRY. 



Tliero are in this count rv <i,91lli,H(10 fanners, 1 ,'J0(),- 

 000 trades people, L',T(I()',()(I(» ineelianies, 2,(;(KI,()U() 

 professional men, 4;i,()(IO clergymen, 4U,()0I) lawyers 

 VJ8,KL"-' teachers, I!-.',(I01I doctors, 2,U()0 actors, 0,i'UUO 

 journaliBtB, 1,000,000 laborers, and 97.5,000 domestic 

 Bervants. 



From tlip above "cliiiping," from the iiew.s 

 cohmiiis of a daily i>aiier, it will be jicrceived 

 in what nunu'i-ical proportions fanners stand 

 to any other single oeeupation in theeounhy, 

 and yet they occupy fewer public places, re- 

 ceive less legislative favors, and are -sub- 

 ject to lieavier governmental l)urdens than 

 any other single class of American citizens. 

 In numerical strength they are more than all 

 the traders, mechanics ami i)rofessionals put 

 together, by some hundred tliousands, and it 

 would not lie hazarding much to say, that, 

 excepting laborers and domestics, there is not 

 a single one of the above classes that has not, 

 proportionally, litty or a hundred times the 

 political and otlicial inlhicuce they have. This 

 is all radically wrong. Under circumstances 

 as they ought to be no one can presume to 

 know what the farmers of tlie country need 

 by way of protective laws and social and do- 

 mestic privileges so well as the farmers tliem- 

 selves. If they don't know then it evinces 

 that tliere is something wrong somewhere. It 

 has long since been written that '■' knatfledge 

 !.s jDOU'tc," but where and how is that power 

 to be obtained V Not by clo.sing their eyes 

 and ears against that which is "written," for 

 that would involve the rejection of the oracles 

 of divine truth; and we would further .say, 

 that there is no real truth that is nut divine. 

 Knowledge is, or ought to be dillusive, and 

 the most eflicient means for its diffusion is the 

 printfng press ; and if farmers desire to occu- 

 py the social plane for which nature and na- 

 ture's God designed them, they must avail 

 themselves of the medium of the press, 

 " Here shall the prcsit the people's rights maintain,' 

 " L'uawed by conquest and uul)ri!)ed by gain," 



has become an axiom of uiuversal rec- 

 ognition, in all lands under the dominion of 

 civil liberty; and it behooves every one to 

 read, for it is the only means of preserving 

 social, civil and religious equality. The indi- 

 vidual who cauuoj read, is to be i)itied; but 

 the one who will not read, surely merits some- 

 thing worse; else, why are we admonished to 

 ''search the Scriptures," and how search them 

 if we cannot read ? Time was, in the most 

 ancient days of the human fomily, when there 

 were no Scriptures, and man had direct inter- 

 course with his Creator; but when he fell from 

 his original integrity, other means of coniiuu- 

 nication became necessary, and the Scriptures 

 were wrillen ; and then the obligation to learn 

 to read gradually devolved upon the human 

 family, and has now become a solemn injunc- 

 tion, and will remain so until the end. Re- 

 turning again to our "text" we find tliat there 

 are in roimd numbers, 40,000 lawyers, 40,000 

 clergymen and 00,000 doctors, either one of 

 which, as the world goes, weighs as much in 

 the social and political scales as the 0,000,000 

 farmers do, and all because they read — indeed 

 it would be impossible for them to become 

 cither lawyers, doctors, or clergymen, unless 

 they learned to read. It is the gravest error 

 that anv class of men could possibly make, to 

 argue that superior intellectual (lualifications 

 only enable those who possess them to become 

 superior adepts in knavery, dishonesty, sin 

 and fraud; for this is only the abuse of a no- 

 ble privilege, contrary to the apostolic injunc- 

 tion to "use all things as not abusing them." 

 The popidation of our country to-day is sup- 

 posed to be about 40,0(X),000, and estimating 

 one-half of these to be females, would 

 leave 20,000,000 of the male sex. Now, 



the different cla.sses in our text, foot up 

 about sixteen nnllions in round numbers, 

 leaving four millions of vital .' i'erhaps bank- 

 ers, drovers and iienltoncn, with a liberal 

 sprinkling of nondescripts that cannot be 

 cla.ssilied, l)ut who, nevertheless, subsist upon 

 the productions of tho farmer. Tiike up a 

 biographical history of the world, or any sepa- 

 rate nation, and it will be foimd that much 

 the largc^st number of the lives of the distin- 

 guished men recorded therein have been l)orn 

 in some obscure village or rural district, and 

 comparatively few eitlier in a town or city. 

 Many of thein sprang from farmer parentage, 

 and when they became distinguished would 

 point to that ancestral origin with pride; and 

 when they have had a surfeit of (aiblicor pro- 

 fessional life, hav(! returned again with long- 

 ing desire to the (luiet and ))eaceful shades of 

 the farm. We opine this world, in its civil, 

 .soci.al, and ecimomic ilffairs, will never be 

 quite right, until that class of men who feed 

 the world exercise more of the controling in- 

 tlueuces that give character to its domestic 

 goverimient — its official administration. But 

 to (pialify any class of men for the eliicient 

 discharge of their ollicial duties they must 

 read, observe and think. We do not, however, 

 advise farmers to an energetic mental culture 

 for the sake of merely qualifying them for 

 othce — indeed (unless like Cincinnatus of old, 

 ttiey are sought after,) we would counsel them 

 against ever permitting their aspirations to 

 runofliceward as a speculation. But we w'ould 

 recommend a wider scope of intelligi^nt labor 

 in the development of our agricultural re- 

 sources ; a more intelligent discrimination in 

 the exercise of their political franchi.ses, and 

 a larger and more diversietid field of social 

 culture, as .aims far above the aims of office 

 for the sake of office. 



"BEES stinging;fruit." 



There is a great complaint throughout ftcading of 

 Ijees stinging fruit and thereby making it rot. It is 

 alleged tliere have been many bushels of the most 

 valuable peaches and pears efung by the bees and 

 ruined. The other day a lady in preserving fruit was 

 literally surrounded by bees. They flew about her 

 head in a large swarm, lit ujjon the stove, clung to 

 the vessel containing tlu' fruit and were also by the 

 dozen on the ladle used in stirring tiie fruit. 



It is said fully a pint of bees were killed while the 

 preserving was going on, and it is fortunate the pre- 

 serves were not ruined. As it was, dead bees were 

 Ibund in the preserves. Besides stinging tlie fruit 

 the bees have now attacked the grapes and are ruin- 

 ing valuable bunefics of them. It is said the bees 

 come from luves kept in the city, the owners of 

 which sell the honey. 



From year to year this business of keeping hives 

 of bees in Iteading has grown until the number of 

 hives of bees now kept amounts to hundreds. In 

 the city, outside of the sugar and molasses hogsheads 

 in grocery stores, and scattering flowers, the bees 

 have little else to live ujion except fruit, and hence 

 it is tliat tlie fruit is stung by them.— Biy/t. 



This is a subject upon which there seems to 

 be a great diversity of opinion, and perhaps 

 no tw'o observers would be able to record the 

 same testimony — indeed the above heading, 

 which we often notice in relation to this sub- 

 ject, is not a true representation of the fact, 

 for in the sense in which alone a bee can sting, 

 we can assure our readers that it is altogether 

 improbable, if not impossible, that a bee 

 would sting fruit. That they could cut the 

 tender skin of a ripe peach, pear, plum or 

 grape, is (juite probable, but as to whether 

 they xrould do it or not, tliere are various opin- 

 ions, founded upon various experiences. Even 

 if it is certain that they are guilty of this 

 habit, it does not constitute a case siifliciently 

 strong to warrant the total extermination of 

 the bees, for tliis would be like destroying all 

 sailing crafts because they sometimes capsize 

 and destroy life, or like demolishing all rail- 

 road cars because they sometimes run over 



and kill or mangle Imman beings. If the 

 question wa.s naiTowed do^vn to bees or no 

 bees, sailing vessels or no .sailing vessels, rail- 

 road cars or no railroad cars, tliere would be 

 little dilliculty in coming to a unanimous 

 opinion, and we feel certain that it would not 

 be an tidverse one. S(mie .special admirers of 

 Ih'cs, especially if they po.ssess thrifty bees, 

 aii<l have no fiuitthat they iiarticularly value, 

 will testify not only that bees will not cut the 

 skin of fruit, f)ut also that they cannot: but 

 this is certainly not based upon a profound 

 knowledge of the character of bees, and of 

 their organic structuie. There are certain 

 organic characters that pertain to all the Ily- 

 menopterous insects, and some of them jjos- 

 sess it in a very liigh degree, and one of those 

 is their power to cut into and through liard or 

 tough substances, and they aft i)erform this 

 oiieration with the same instruments; namely, 

 their inandihles, or jaws. The common 

 *"Wood-borer," or "Carpenter bee," vf ill cut 

 a bole into a pretty hard piece of wood, al- 

 though it most generally selects soft pine. 

 Other wood-boring hymeiiopterous larva; are 

 known to have cut their way through a 

 dozen i>lies of black cassimere, in cases wliere 

 the cloth has been rolled around a piece of 

 wood that previously contained the eggs, or 

 the young grubs in embryo, and oa one occa- 

 sion we obtained the perfect t insects, under 

 these same circumstances. Tlie l;''Homet" 

 and the common ||"AVasi>" are well known 

 to possess great maudiliular or cutting power, 

 and often lacerate apples, pears, peaches, 

 plums and grapes, destructively, and without, 

 much effort. Every woman that has raised 

 roses, has had occasion to deplore the depre- 

 dations of the little (S"llose-leaf cutter bee," 

 using its jaws as deftly and with as mucli 

 lirecision as a practiced garment cutter, in 

 cutting circular disks out of her rose 

 leaves. Now, this last named individual is 

 not far removed from the common H "Honey 

 bee," for it belongs to the same family. In- 

 deed when we consider that all Ilymenopter- 

 ous insects have to cut their way out through 

 the pupa skin or cocoon that envelopes them, 

 the iiitegument of which in many instances is 

 infinitely more tough than a fruit skin, espec- 

 ially that of a grape, we need not be .surprised 

 that bees would cut grapes, if they had not 

 easier access to other food. We well remem- 

 ber in our boyhood how we used to imprison 

 bees of various kinds in the flowers of the 

 "morning-glory," and other trumpet shaped 

 flowers, ju.st to see how very easily many of 

 them could cut a hole through the side and 

 make their e-scaiie. We could cite hundreds 

 of cases illustrating the mandibular or cutting 

 powers of Hymeuopterous in-sects, but let 

 these suffice for the present. 



We have never ourself detected liees in the 

 act of cutting the skins of fruit, but we have 

 seen thousands of them extracting honey from 

 fruit, tlie skin of which had cracked, or had 

 lieen previously broken through other causes; 

 but from our knowledge of the organic struc- 

 ture of their mouth iiarts,we are veryfar from 

 asserting tliat they coahl not do so, or n-ould 

 not do so, under certain provocations which 

 they could not resist. 



1' he editor of a Reading newspaper, some 

 weeks ago, came out in a vigorous a-s-sanlt 

 upon tlie char.acfer of bees, and although all 

 he says of their grajie-cutting propensities 

 may be as true as much that we receive from 

 similar sources, yet his preventive recommen- 

 dations are of a malignant, if not a diabolical 

 type, to speak as mildly of them as we i)0ssi- 

 bly can; and are not justified by a considera- 

 tion of all the circumstances. In thisconnee 



•Xylocopa VirKiuicii. tUroc«rUB cyarieUB. :Veiipii Miicu- 

 lala. iPoUatea tHiBcalui. jC'elioxys octodeutata. ^lApli 

 MulUaca. 



