THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



395 



hive, only think what a decent hive 

 would come to, by the rule of three 1 

 Then there's the freight too, if they 

 come by telegraph, for the ticking 

 clerk in the office always figures that 

 out high ; and so I «m afraid that, if 

 sent by that line, they might in the 

 end co'st more than they would come 

 to. Aunt Dinah says she has read 

 somewhere in the Penny Whistle 

 Weekly, (which she gets every now 

 and then at tlie grocer's around some 

 articles she buys), that they now send 

 these bees, or some kind of bees, by 

 mail. That, I think, must be a good 

 joke! Why, you might as well send 

 a basketful of hornets by express. 

 Phew, I'd like to stand at a safe dis- 

 tance away and see our sober-faced, 

 steady old postmaster open the bag 

 when they arrived! Wouldn't he 

 make tracks in a hurrry, and feel 

 worser nor if he had a dozen big fleas 

 in his ear V No, no, that's a little too 

 tough a yarn to be swallowed by any 

 but a greenhorn, though it is in print. 

 But have those bees I will, sooner or 

 later ; and if they don't come quite as 

 dear as cousin Zeke reckons it out, 

 I'll get you, Mr. Printer, to have 'em 

 sent by rail and steam even if they 

 don't come till after Christmas. I'd 

 have them sent by express, but that 

 moves as slow in these parts as our 

 old ox team used to do in old Middle- 

 sex, on Saturday nights, when we had 

 hitched tip to go sparking. Don't for- 

 get to tell the man who sells and 

 sends them, to be sure to give them 

 food enough for such a long jaunt, as 

 the poor things musn't be let starve 

 on the way. Tell him, too, to pack 

 them well and hurry them forward— 

 " loith speed and cure, right side up 1" 



Before I close, Mr. Printer, I want 

 to say further, tliat when cousin Up- 

 son was here he told us there was 

 great fuss just now away up in the 

 old States, about some wonderful im- 

 provements in bee-keeping, which he 

 said they call" scientitic bee-culture." 

 Now what is tliat V How is it made ? 

 How big is it y Is it patented ? Does 

 it go by machinery V Is it hard to 

 learn how to work it ? Or must you 

 go to a sort of school or college to 

 study how to manage it, till you get 

 the hang of it gradually? Couldn't 

 an old man learn to fix it up, without 

 leaving home? IIow is one to get 

 science into a bee gum, I'd like to 

 know 'f That's a little above my 

 huckleberry, as we used to say at 

 Haddam school, when a hard ques- 

 tion came up, and puzzled the head 

 scholar of the class, though we had 

 to work it out, for all that. Well, 

 well, there was no lightening tele- 

 graph in tliem days, and nobody then 

 dreamt of gold in California : so there 

 may be sometliing new in managing 

 bees, thougli the wise man said, long 

 years before I was born, There's 

 nothing new under the sun. You'll 

 print all about it, I suppose, and we'll 

 see what it is when the paper comes. 

 Send it on at once anyhow, or some- 

 how. 



Palo Pinto, Texas, Nov. 3, 1870. 



N. B.— Wife says, be sure to ask 

 whether it's certain that the new bees 

 can make honey. Our old ones are 



rather poor hands at it, and some 

 years don't let us have any. Now, 

 even if the striped fellows should pro- 

 duce six times as much, it wouldn't 

 amount to anything, after all ; for in 

 Deacon Downer's school we were 

 alwavs told that 6 times 0=0 ; and we 

 had "to believe it, for not even the 

 smartest boy in the class could prore 

 that it wasn't so, and the Deacon ever 

 insisted on proof. 



smm&!MmM 



'WuX^fim 



'^*^ ;^-' -_ 



But Two or Three Warm Days.— 



Cold here yet. We had a frost here 

 this morning ; you could scrape it up 

 in piles on the tin covers of my bee 

 hives, still it was not hard enough to 

 kill anything. We have had but 2 or 

 3 of what could be called warm days 

 here this season. The mercury has 

 not been above SO- only one day, while 

 last year it was above 90^ several days 

 during May. Apple blossoms are 

 now nearly gone here, but on the 

 hills the trees are in full bloom. Last 

 Thursday (Sth) the bees got some 

 honey from tlie bloom, but a rain in 

 the afternoon stopped work, and it 

 has been cold ever since. Glad to see 

 others are prospering. 



G. M. DOOLITTLE. 



Borodino, N. Y., June 12, 1882. 



Madeira Wine.— The recipe for Ma- 

 deira wine from honey on page 339;is 

 a correct translation of Dzierzon's in 

 Berlepsch's great work. The only 

 omission at the end is : " the bottles 

 containing the wine should be buried 

 in the sand— kept moist by being 

 sprinkled now and then with brine." 

 Berlepsch, quoting Dzierzon, says : 

 " After a few years this wine is 

 worthy to be served on the tables of 

 princes." The only objectionable 

 feature in the recipe is the old chemi- 

 cal superstition that a bright copper 

 or brass kettle is not dangerous to 

 use. It is really astonishing how 

 tenacious a hold the fallacy has upon 

 the people that, as long as they do not 

 let the fluid get cool in a bright cop- 

 per vessel, there is no danger. 



L. K. 



Savannah, Ga., June 2, 1882. 



had been favorable, considering the 

 strength of my bees, I would have 

 obtained 50 pounds of honey per colony 

 from buckeye. It commenced bloom- 

 ing the 2d of May, and is in bloom 

 yet. The honey is white as that from 

 "linden, and I like the flavor better. 

 There was some honey from crab ap- 

 ple bloom in it, wliich I think im- 

 proved the flavor. Wm. Malone. 

 Oakley, Iowa, May 26, 1882. 



Buckeye Honey.— Bees in this local- 

 ity have had a hard time this spring, 

 and many kept in the old way have 

 died in May. I wintered 19 colonies. 

 All came through in good condition. 

 I commenced feeding in March to 

 stimulate them, in which I succeeded 

 and on the 8th of April the strongest 

 had 6 to 8 frames full of brood ; then 

 came a cold wave, and since that 

 time I have been feeding at spells. 

 Once, before I was aware of it, the 

 bees had uncapped nearly all the 

 young brood, and eaten the food from 

 the young bees. Nearly all of the 

 honey this spring has come from the 

 buckeye. I am satisfied, if the spring 



Outlook has Never been Better. — 



The outlook for lioney has never been 

 better than this season, and the honey 

 bee interest is largely on the increase. 

 We bid you God siieed in battling for 

 a pure honey against the glucose com- 

 binations, and for a higher strain of 

 bees. W. K. Marshall. 



Marshall, Tex., June 12, 1882. 



Good Following Bad.— I had 43 colo- 

 nies in the fall of 1880, and lost 41 of 

 them. The 2 colonies left were very 

 weak. One of the two colonies 

 swarmed twice, and I made a two- 

 story hive of tlie weaker colony and 

 extracted 100 lbs. from it : the other 

 gave me 100 lbs. of box honey and 

 some extracted. Last spring I began 

 cleaning out tlie hives of dead bees, 

 and setting thein back on the sum- 

 mer stands for the bees to finish 

 cleaning up the honey. As I could 

 not buy any bees handy, I began to 

 wish for some bees to come along, 

 and, sure enough, the last day of May 

 a fine swarm came along and went 

 into one of ray hives. That raised my 

 spirits a little. So I kept on, think- 

 ing or wishing, or something else, 

 and on the 4tli of June 2 more came ; 

 in a few days another came, making 4 

 in all. The first that came gave me 

 .5 boxes of lioney, wortli S1.25 per box, 

 and swarmed once, besides we ex- 

 tracted from the old colony in August 

 right smart. The third colony that 

 came swarmed twice ; which makes 

 11 colonies to winter. I packed 8 of 

 them in big boxes that I made for 

 that purpose several years ago. Not 

 one colony lived in them that winter, 

 but I am going to try it again. I put 2 

 bricks on some of them, and corn- 

 cobs on 2, besides chaff and straw. In 

 the Bee Journal for December, 1870, 

 is a letter from Texas, that ought to 

 be reprinted for young bee-keepers. 

 H. M. Noble. 



Swedesburgh, Iowa. 



[The letter is republished in this 

 number.— Ed.] 



Doing Well on White Clover.— I am 



glad to be able to say my bees are do- 

 ing well, although April and May were 

 miserable months. I kept my bees 

 breeding by constant feeding. I win- 

 tered 26 colonies without any loss, 

 and have increased this spring so far 

 to 47. all in fair condition for white 

 clover, which is now blooming, and 

 upon which my bees have been very 

 busy the last few days, which is really 

 the first harvest they have had this 

 season, as the fruit bloom was all 

 frosted. VVm. B. McCormick. 



LTiiiontown, Pa., June 10, 1882. 



