THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



185 



boney which is left a long time on the 

 hive, will ripen, even if sealed. To 

 my mind the explanation of this is 

 found in Mr.Dibbern's article on page 

 150. When any honey begins to work 

 or ferment, the bees find it out and 

 attend to it themselves. 



There might, however, be one point 

 which would divide the decision of 

 the question, between Mr. Hutchin- 

 son and mvselt. It might be that 

 during the luirry and bustle of a big 

 crop, the bees do not seal tlie cells as 

 carefully as they would afterwards, 

 and perhaps the leaving of the honey 

 in the hive until long after the crop 

 is ended, permits them to attend to 

 what they had before neglected. This 

 would explain why honey-comb, which 

 has been a long time on the hive, is 

 tougher than tliat which is removed 

 as soon as sealed. But the fact re- 

 mains to me most positive, that the 

 " bees aim at compact coverings for 

 their honey, while the caps of the 

 brood-cells are porous !" 



I would suggest to Mr. Dibbern, 

 that the honey in old combs ferments 

 more readily, only when this old comb 

 has contained unsealed honey which 

 has fermented in the cells. If all the 

 honey put by the bees into old comb 

 fermented, there would not be an 

 ounce of sound honey in the brood- 

 chamber of an old colony. Like the 

 juice of all fruits, honey will ferment 

 in sealed vessels if it contains the 

 minute germs, or spores, that are the 

 seed of fermentation. The fermenta- 

 tion is more or less prompt, more or 

 less active, according to the different 

 degrees of temperature and the 

 greater or less amount of watery par- 

 ticles, which furnish the oxygen in- 

 dispensable to such transformation. 



Hamilton,*© Ills. 



For tbe Amencan Bee Joamal. 



CMff Hives for Winter. 



C. G. BEITEL. 



In Mr. J. H. Andre's letter, on page 

 154, he advances an idea that I have 

 had for some time. I winter all my 

 bees on the summer stands in chaff 

 hives, but I could never see the benetit 

 of chaff on the sides, for although an 

 absorbentof moisture, none can reach 

 it there, surrounded and enclosed with 

 boards as it is, and I had decided to 

 try a hive which contains air-tight 

 chambers, lined with paper, but this 

 as well as the chaff hive can only re- 

 tain the warmth but a short time be- 

 yond a single-walled hive, and pre- 

 vents the rays of the sun from warm- 

 ing it as quickly as a single-walled 

 hive. I have never had much loss 

 from the chaff hives, but my objection 

 to them is their weight and cost over 

 single-walled hives. 



Now my convictions are, that bees 

 never die from cold if properly pre- 

 pared; give them plenty of good 

 food, have them strong, and they will 

 survive the most protracted cold 

 spells, because in these spells they do 

 what Mr. Clarke calls " hibernating," 

 and they eat little or nothing. Diar- 

 rhea is not caused by pollen, but by 



bad ventilation, so that they are com- 

 pelled to absorb or inhale their own 

 moisture, sweat, breath, or whatever 

 it is called (which in the case of 

 humanity we all know is a deadly 

 poison), to obviate which an absorb- 

 ent, such as a cushion on top, is nec- 

 essary. I have therefore come to the 

 conclusion that a single-walled hive, 

 with a half-story on top containing a 

 cushion, with plenty of good food,will 

 see any strong colony through the 

 coldest winter. 

 Easton,o Pa. 



For tne American Bee Journal. 



Protection of Apicnltnral Inventions. 



J. E. POND. 



The principle upon which our 

 patent laws are based is as nearly 

 correct as it is possible to make it. 

 The best minds in the world have 

 given the subject careful attention 

 and study, with tlie result that our 

 system of patent-right protection is 

 the model one of the world. The basis 

 of these laws is the generally recog- 

 nized idea, by all men of all countries, 

 that the inventive genius of man in 

 any direction that will prove of value, 

 should as much be protected as any 

 other property he may possess, and 

 for the reason that the results of 

 brain-labor are property in any sense 

 in which the word can be used ; and 

 to take advantage of these results 

 without the consent of the inventor 

 is theft, and theft of a meaner kind 

 than that of purloining his horses, 

 cattle or money. All honest men ad- 

 mit this, and admitting it, they ought 

 in common decency to respect such 

 property rights as much as they do 

 the contents of a man's pocket-book. 



Unfortunately all men are not thus 

 honest, and many that would not steal 

 a penny seem to think that it is all 

 right to rob an inventor by using his 

 invention without his consent, and if 

 possible without his knowledge. The 

 patent law steps in here, and guaran- 

 tees to the honest inventor such pro- 

 tection as it can afford. What is this 

 protection '? It is the granting to the 

 inventor the right tor a certain length 

 of time to own and control his inven- 

 tion, and to pursue the infringer and 

 make him pay such money damages 

 as he can show that he has suffered. 



Now it may not be known to all 

 that law in patent cases can only be 

 purchased at very expensive figures, 

 and right here is where the trouble 

 lies in protecting patent bee-hives 

 and apicultural appliances. The in- 

 ventor and patentee of a valuable 

 machine that costs largely to produce, 

 or that is used largely in expensive 

 manufactures, can well afford to pay 

 the high cost of litigation, as the 

 damages that will be gained are large 

 also. Now let us apply this idea to 

 the inventor of a bee-hive, section or 

 any other article of use in the apiary. 

 In the first place the demand for such 

 articles is limited, to a certain extent, 

 and the profit necessarily very small ; 

 the infringer, as a rule, is not a man- 

 ufacturer (supplying a large trade, 



but an individual in an apiary of not 

 very considerable size. The cost of 

 pursuing into the courts an infringer 

 in a small way, is the same, or nearly 

 so, as the large one, but the damages 

 received in the way of cash, or its 

 equivalent, is small, and in nearly 

 every case would not be sufficient to 

 pay the fee charged, and earned too, 

 by the attorney conducting the suit. 



In cases like the above, protection 

 does not protect, for while the law is 

 ample, the inventor is ruined in ap- 

 plying it for purposes of self-protec- 

 tion. 



For the above reasons, and for 

 many others that might be given, 

 would they not make this article too 

 long, I deem the patenting of any 

 appliance of our apiaries as an expen- 

 sive luxury, and one that will not 

 serve the intended purpose. Not that 

 I do not believe in patents, for I do 

 most thoroughly and completely ; but 

 the experience of Father Langstroth 

 is ever before me, and 1 know of no 

 reason whv any other would succeed 

 better than he did. The remedy for 

 this state of things may be made the 

 subject of a future article ; a com- 

 plete one will be found, however, in 

 the application of the " golden I'ule," 

 by allowing to every honest inventor 

 all his legal and moral rights in his 

 invention, and respecting his property 

 produced by brain labor, as though it 

 was his actual chattels or money. 



If this state of things should ob- 

 tain, there would be far less bickering 

 and disputes over hives, etc., and I 

 guarantee that no larger prices would 

 be demanded for them than we are 

 now paying. Is there a bee-keeper in 

 the country who does not recognize 

 the obligations of the moral law ? 

 Why not then apply the same to their 

 dealings with their fellow-men ? 



Foxboro,o+ Mass. 



For t&e American Bee JonniaJ. 



Plienol and Font Brood. 



S. J. TOUNQMAJsr. 



The first known case of foul brood 

 in this county (Montcalm) was dis- 

 covered by Mr. A. F. Moon (a veteran 

 bee-master, but now deceased) while 

 transferring a colony from a box-hive 

 to the Harbison hive, over 20 years 

 ago. Mr. Moon was assisted by a 

 Mr. Hiram Rossman; although the 

 malady had never before been seen 

 by Mr. Rossman, it was not new to 

 Mr. Moon, who had met with it re- 

 peatedly in transferring. 



In the fall of 1885, Mr. Rossman and 

 myself visited an apiary near Green- 

 ville, Mich., where foul brood was 

 said to exist. Mr. R. was able at 

 once to detect the presence of the dis- 

 ease, principally by the peculiar odor 

 arising from the hive when opened, 

 and later on by the depleted condition 

 of the hive, and other unmistakable 

 characteristics of the disease. This 

 one case seemed to be all, although it 

 was quite an extensive apiary, and 

 the bee-keeper had been careless. We 

 advised him to destroy the affected 

 colony, which he did, and he recently 



