1907 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



649 



abolition of the saloons; still, the cost of permitting 

 the liquor-trafflc to go on in the District amounts to a 

 sum that stagtjers one. If the $3,778,733 were divided 

 by two, you still have left against the taxpayers 

 $1,689,347. 



Mr. Webber gives us also letters, some of 

 them lengthy, from the superintendent of 

 the jail, of the workhovase, of the insane-asy- 

 lum, giving it as their conscientious opinion 

 that strong drink is at the bottom of all these 

 troubles. If 1 had space I should like to 

 give the letters in full. The pamphlet con- 

 taining this report has 47 pages. Many of 

 them are mostly tine print; and yet with this 

 great tiood of evidence against the saloons 

 the Commissioners of the District of Colum- 

 bia rendered a decision that it would be "im- 

 practicable to enforce such a law as the bill 

 proposes." 1 respectfully ask these com- 

 missioners to go down to Kansas City, Kan- 

 sas, and talk to the gang that declared it im- 

 possible to enforce the prohibition laws in 

 that city of 100,000 people. 



Now, friends, this is our affair. It rests 

 on the shoulders of every one of us. Shall 

 the vei'y heart and center of our free land 

 continue to waste money and send our peo- 

 ple to perdition in the way in which the above 

 shows up? I hope every man, woman, and 

 child who gets a sight of this page will read 

 these extracts over and over. 



man prilssure 



GADDENING 



A.L^pOT 



HOT-BEDS AND COLD-FRAME SASHES; HOW 



TO PREVENT THEM FROM BEING 



BLOWN OFF. 



It was recently my pleasure to look over 

 the immense store and greenhouses of the 

 Peter Henderson Co. When Peter Hender- 

 son died, several years ago, 1 had a sort of 

 feeling that the business would run down, at 

 least for a time. I do not know but it is nat- 

 ural for old men to be afraid " the boys " will 

 not succeed in looking after a great business 

 like that "after father is gone." Well, it 

 was one of my happy surprises to notice how 

 this establishment has grown up in almost 

 every way. The greenhouses are not much 

 larger than they were when the great mar- 

 ket-gardener and florist, Peter Henderson, 

 was alive. But the seed trade is developed 

 wonderfully. 



Just below the greenhouses along the rail- 

 road track I saw an immense building with 

 the name of the company on it in gigantic 

 letters. I wondered what such a great build- 

 ing in that locality could be for; but when I 

 got around on another side I saw the single 

 word "Seeds," also in gigantic letters. Tnis 

 immense warehouse, big enough to let a whole 

 train of cars in, was simply to store the seeds 

 they handle. I used to be greatly interested 



in growing vegetable-plants; and I was great- 

 ly taken up some years ago, as some of you 

 may remember, with Henderson's plan of 

 starting seeds in a greenhouse, and trans- 

 planting them into Hats to be carried to the 

 open air, so they could be covered with 

 sashes when the weather turned cold. Well, 

 this very thing was going on the day I was 

 there. A big gang of men, were caiTying the 

 flats out of the greenhouses and depositing 

 them in cold-frames. This was along the 

 last of March. Of course, the diffex'ent kinds 

 of plants (cabbage, caulitiower, tomato, etc.) 

 will need more or less protection from sashes. 



Now, I think every one who has handled 

 sashes very much has had trouble and worry 

 on account of heavy winds blowing the sash 

 off the beds I have sometimes lost a good 

 many dollars in just a very few minutes, 

 seeing my sashes sail like shingles in a high 

 wind. Various devices have been planned 

 to hold the sashes in place. Hooks and 

 staples to fasten the sashes, sliding them in 

 grooves, etc., have been used. Hooks and 

 staples are almost out of the question if you 

 wish to handle sashes interchangeably, mov- 

 ing them from one bed to another. Well, 

 the Henderson people had a rig that made 

 me smile to think I had not thought of it be- 

 fore. Make your bed as long as you wish. I 

 think some of their beds would hold forty or 

 fifty sashes. In our work we decided on 

 about twenty sashes to each bed, then we could 

 pile them up at each end of the bed when 

 they were not needed, carrying ten sashes 

 one way and ten the other. The plan 1 saw 

 to hold the sashes was like this: 



Put a stake at the end of each bed . Through 

 the top of each stake, a little higher than 

 the glass, put a stout hook. One of these 

 hooks is securely fastened into the stake per- 

 manently. The other has a screw thread cut 

 on it, and goes through the stake, with a lit- 

 tle crank on the outside end. Ivlow, if you 

 turn this crank you can draw the hook out 

 or in. Well, now, all that is needed to fin- 

 ish is a good stout wire with a loop on each 

 end, just long enough to run from one hook 

 to the other across the middle of all the sashes. 

 When you xvork with the sashes this long 

 wire is dropped down in the path. When 

 you quit work, put your sashes in place; lay 

 your long wire across the middle of the whole 

 string of sashes; then turn your crank until 

 the wire becomes taut. If your sashes are 

 all of an exact width it is an easy matter to 

 draw the stakes toward each other so they 

 will squeeze against the outside bars of the 

 .Slashes next to the stake. The sashes should 

 reach over, say an inch or two, at the ends 

 of the beds. Now, this not only holds each 

 sash so no wind can move it, but the pressure 

 pushes them up tight together, so there are 

 no cracks left to let frost or cold air through. 

 While at work your sashes are perfectly 

 loose, with no staples nor attachments in the 

 way. Two men will take them off and put 

 them on with great rapidity. When they 

 are all in place it takes but a moment tt) 

 hook on the wire and then make every thing 

 tight and snug by a few turns of the crank. 



