1907 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



1317 



acter of the Enemy we are Fighting." The 

 above transaction gives a glimpse of the 

 "character " of the great Pabst Brewing Co. ; 

 and it also gives us a glimpse of the way in 

 which the hands of the Department of Agri- 

 culture seem to be tied. But better things 

 are coming; and, may God be praised, they 

 are coming thick and fast. 



BEESTINGS FOK KHEUMATI8M. 



In reply to our good friend on page 1168 

 of our last issue I omitted mentioning bee- 

 stings as a remedy for rheumatism. From 

 facts given in Gleanings for years past, as 

 well as articles given in newspapers, I think 

 there is no disputing the fact that bee-stings 

 often prove a positive remedy for rheumatic 

 pains and for many kinds of rheumatism. 

 Like almost every other remedy, however, 

 it does not seem to operate alike on all sub- 

 jects. Some people, with some kinds of 

 rheumatism, experience immediate relief. 

 Others find themselves almost or quite free 

 from pain the next day. It is a matter easi- 

 ly tested. A year or more ago I related an 

 incident of an old gentleman in our own lo- 

 cality who went into an apiai'y and picked 

 out and purchased the crossest colony of 

 bees the man had, and proceeded to make 

 the bees sting him as soon as they were his 

 property. He said the stings were painful, 

 but greatly to be preferred to the rheumatic 

 pains; and he said, furthermore, that he had 

 kept one colony of bees for several years 

 for no other purpose than to drive away the 

 rheumatic attacks when they came. His 

 neighbors all corroborated his statements. 

 Of course, we do not know how many other 

 sufferei's may be relieved or cured in a like 

 manner. But I would suggest to every per- 

 son who is afflicted with rheumatism to give 

 bee-stings a good thorough test. It is a 

 form of hypodermic injection older than any 

 doctor, and both instrument and medicine 

 are furnished ready made for use, by the 

 great Father of all. 



HIGH PRESSURE 



GADDENING 



A.L^pOT 



selection of seed corn for the next 

 season's crop. 

 On page 45 of this journal for Jan. 1 I 

 spoke about what our Ohio P^xperiment Sta- 

 tion had been doing in the way of getting a 

 strain of corn that was not likely to be blown 

 down by a high wind. In my hand I hold a 

 bulletin from our station in regard to the se- 

 lection of seed corn. I clip the following 

 from page 3: 



VIGOR OF PLANT. 



A second character which is well worthy of consid- 

 eration is vigor. While it is freely admitted that a 

 good ear of corn is a very good recommendation for 

 the plant which produced it, many plants v>roduce 

 good ears which they are unable to carry to harvest. 

 That this character is hercaitary, there is abundant 

 evidence. In a breeding plot of last season (19()6) this 

 station had growing side by side rows planted from 

 individual ears, one of which had 56 and another 49 

 per cent of its plants broken over before harvest. Be- 

 tween, and upon either side of these, were other rows 

 of which, in one instance, not a single plant, and in 

 two others, 3 and 6 per cent only, were broken. The 

 ability to stand upright did not result from a lighter 

 load, for the ear of which 56 per cent of the progeny 

 broke over yielded 7,5.6 bushels per acre, while the ear 

 having every plant upright yielded 114.7 bushels per 

 acre. The broken plant presents a problem which I 

 believe can best be solved by a consideration of the 

 vigor and stiffaess of the mother plant. 



Now, friends, I fear you do not realize the 

 possibilities that lie before you in the direc- 

 tion outlined in the above. How often we 

 hear farmers say, "I should have had a mag- 

 nificent crop of corn had not a terrible wind- 

 storm just about ruined it" I We have been 

 in the habit of considering such catastrophies 

 as unpreventable; but this report from our 

 station tells us that more than half of the 

 stalks from one ear of corn were broken by 

 the wind, while an entire row from another 

 ear of coi-n, that probably looked exactly 

 like the first one, produced plants of such 

 vigor that not one stalk was broken down. 

 I talked with Prof. Holden about this matter, 

 and he suggested that we might go too far in 

 that direction and get a strain of corn with 

 stalks of such vigor that they would with- 

 stand a storm and yet not produce a very 

 high yield of ears, because so much of the 

 growth goes to the stalk. But this bulletin 

 from our station tells us that the row of corn 

 with no stalks blown down yielded 114 bush- 

 els per acre, while the other one, that was 

 more than half broken off, yielded only at 

 the rate of 75 bushels. I presume this yield 

 of 75 bushels was calculated from the stalks 

 that remained standing. Now, what would 

 it be worth to you to have your seed corn all 

 selected from ears from that row with no 

 broken stalks and 114 bushels to the acre? 

 and yet it may be done. In the summary 

 at the end of this bulletin the matter is sum- 

 med up as follows: 



Vigor of plant, as shown by ability to stand upright, 

 is hereditary. Ear-rows growing side by side have 

 shown a variation of from no broken vilants to 56 per 

 cent of broken plants. 



Now, friends, it will pay you who are corn- 

 growers to send to the Ohio Experiment Sta- 

 tion, Wooster, Ohio, for Bulletin No. 71 on 

 the selection of seed corn. 



Right across the way from our home we 

 have a cornfield of half a dozen acres, and I 

 tried to make it after Prof. Holden's teach- 

 ings. A friend who has just made a trip to 

 the Norfolk exposition, and back home by 

 way of New York, says it is the best-looking 

 field of corn he saw on the whole trip. Of 

 course it is rather late, as we could not get 

 it planted in shape to suit us until after the 

 usual planting time. I am now looking for- 

 ward to the time when I can go through that 

 tield and select ears for planting next year. 



