THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



37 



kuows the honey carried from the diseased 

 hive is al consumed in four days, the answer 

 would be, he knows it is so, because the 

 treatment based on this assumption cures. 

 This reasoning has always seemed to me to 

 be inconclusive. It precludes the possibility 

 of there being any other way of accounting 

 for the cure, and observed facts are against 

 it. I recently met with an account of one 

 of Mr. D. A. Jones' experiments in which he 

 kept a cluster of bees wi hout food for 

 eighteen days, and, even at the end of this 

 period, only a few bees were starved. It is a 

 matter of indifference whether the honey 

 carried from the diseased hive is used up in 

 comb building in four days or not. In itself 

 this honey is neither better nor worse than 

 other honey, and what becomes of it is of 

 no consequence ; but the question of what 

 becomes of the germs suspended in it is all- 

 important. Mr. J. A. Green has suggested 

 that they are digested with. the honey, but 

 this is disproved by the fact that the germs 

 are found with their vitality unimpaired, af- 

 ter having passed through the digestive or- 

 gans of the bee. I.; must be plain that the 

 supposition that the disease is cured, because 

 the infection from the diseased hive is all 

 destroyed in four days, cannot be justified, 

 and had better be abandoned once for all. 



With regard to the point raised by Mr. 

 Taylor, that if the infection of the brood re- 

 sults from the diseased condition of the 

 nurses, all the brood would become diseased 

 at once, whereas in the early stages only a 

 few larva? are affected, I would say that when 

 using the term " diseased nurses," I had in 

 mind nurses in whose chyle stomachs germs 

 might be found, as well as those into whose 

 tissues the microbes might have penetrated, 

 although it is doubtful whether the former 

 can be correctly said to be diseased. We 

 have no evidence that the germs multiply 

 in the chyle stomach. On account of the 

 acidity of its contents they probably do not. 

 This class of nurse bees, into whose tissues 

 the germs have not penetrated, probably 

 have no more germs to distribute, than were 

 contained in the food they consumed. The 

 milk of cows, suffering from tuberculosis, is 

 said to contain the germs of the disease. In 

 the case of nurse bees whose tissues contain 

 microbes, the brood food secreted in the 

 head glands very likely contains germs, 

 though Cheshire says that on examination 

 he did not find them. In a late article in the 

 A. B. J. I advanced reasons for the belief 



that such nurses either die early or soon dis- 

 continue nursing. In view of the foregoing 

 ttie theory that the larvse get the infection 

 from the nurse bees does not appear to be 

 at variance with the fact that in the early 

 stages of the disease only a fewlarvte are af- 

 fected. 



I have often thought about that •' pole 

 star " hive of Mr. T ylor's. The stock was 

 not very badly diseased, or it would not have 

 cast a swarm. Whether nurse bees, having 

 germs in their tissues, would be more likely 

 to stay at home at swarming time, than those 

 free from them we have no means of know- 

 ing, but, assuming that some bees did carry 

 germs with them, and that they were fed to 

 the lar\a?, the increase in ihs vitality of both 

 bees and brood, resulting from abundant 

 nourishment, and from the influence of the 

 swarming impulse, would be favorable to 

 the destruction of the germs by the phago- 

 cytes. These reasons for the disappearance 

 of foul brood in the swarm are strengthened 

 by the fact that attempts to cure the disease 

 by shaking the bees from the diseased combs 

 on frames filled with foundation, often fail. 



Lindsay, Ont. 



Jan. 23, 1894. 



[In order that this subject might be seen in 

 as many lights as possible, I sent proof of 

 the foregoing to Mr. R. L. Taylor, and 

 asked him to express his views on the sub- 

 ject, which he has done as follows. — Ed.] 



I do not find myself able to agree with Mr. 

 Cornell in his conclusions that the germs of 

 foul brood find more favorable conditions 

 for their propagation in dead brood than in 

 healthy brood. It seems to me that he over- 

 looks the fact that abscence of resistance — 

 phagocytes — is not the only requirement in 

 order to secure a favorable nidus for the 

 germs of disease. Indeed that, it seems to 

 me, is not the chief requirement, for as he 

 justly intimates the disease may prevail not- 

 withstanding resistance, for as he says large 

 numbers of germs may o ercome that, and a 

 lack of vitality from any cause would make 

 the conquest easier, :,ut they cannot over- 

 come the want of proper warmth and m is- 

 ture nor a lack of a position within the tis- 

 sues of the larva. Are they very likely to 

 find such warmth and moisture on the out- 

 side of a dead larva ? Or is there ny like- 

 lihood that the germ will gain a positio_ 

 within the tissues of the dead larva by bei g 



