1918 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



195 



never had such a time before, and 

 never want to see it again. We con- 

 tinually stopped the cracks which 

 opened in the old, rotten hives, with 

 clay, but it did not help much. The 

 richest joke came when we reached 

 town, at about 9 o'clock. We had the 

 streets for ourselves and the bees. 

 We lost ten colonies scattered along 

 the trail. Of course we went back, 

 nailed the boxes together and 

 stopped the cracks with clay and 

 brought them all safe to town and 

 depot. 



I am thinking of giving up my ac- 

 tual apiary work here to have more 

 time to follow my real inclinations of 

 researches and investigations, espe- 

 cially in apiculture. There is a large 

 field open here in this respect and 

 hardly a week passes that I do not 

 find something new and unexpected 

 among the bees. Since I am known 

 here, I can well afford it, as every 

 beekeeper will gladly extend his hos- 

 pitality to me for the little help and 

 advice I can give in return. I also 

 will have more time to inform the 

 readers of the American Bee Journal 

 of my doings, and to put down for 

 our station in Texas my observations 

 in tropical beekeeping. 



Questions Answered 



With the two last mail steamers 1 

 received a number of inquiries from ■ 

 readers of the American Bee Journal 

 which it is impossible to answer sep- 

 arately. 



W. Va. — I have not met any bee 

 diseases. 



Market for the honey is now New 

 York. 



I do not know what honey is worth 

 at present. 



No winter in the tropics. 



Property is safe here, but they cer- 

 tainly steal honey out of the apiaries 

 if no one lives there. 



Nectar is coming in the whole year, 

 more or less. A real flow I have seen, 

 at the end of December, January and 

 February. They told me that the 

 main flow is in June, July and part of 

 August. 



Ulster, Pa. — I cannot use any U. S. 

 stamps for letters here. 



Thank you for your compliments 

 about my articles. 



Your other questions do not belong 

 in the American Bee Journal, but 

 if the editor does not mind, I can in- 

 form the readers also about quality. 

 price of land, population, etc., as I 

 am going to buy myself. (Will be 

 glad of a short article on this sub- 

 ject. — Editor.) 



There are no poisonous snakes 

 here, as far as I know. 



There is lots of room for people 

 like you without killing the natives. 

 There is some reason for their lazi- 

 ness; nature produces everything 

 they need. So why should they 

 work? 



Dallas, Tex. — I do not know if you 

 can stand the climate here. I never 

 have been sick and my health is im- 

 proving. 



Lots of mosquitoes in some parts, 

 and in some less. I cannot sleep 

 without a mosquito bar. 



S. Carolina. — Not advisable for 

 strangers to buy land here. I know 

 several cases where buyers had to 

 pay twice. If you have a friend to 

 advise you it is better. 



The bulk of the honey is produced 

 in hollow logs. The natives press it 

 out, brood and all, put it in gasoline 

 cans, stop the opening with a green 

 corncob and sell it in the little coun- 

 try villages to the buyers, who sift it 

 through coarse wire netting into 50- 

 gallon barrels. This is the stuff that is 

 ruining the honey market for the 

 tropics. For about two or three 

 weeks it tastes all right, but after 

 that time it gets a nasty taste and is 

 hardly fit for table use. I send sam- 

 ples of extracted honey to dealers 

 and also to the American Bee Jour- 

 nal 



Sanchez, R. D. 



Beekeeping in Jerusalem 



By Ph. J. Baldensperger 



JUST seventy years ago my father 

 arrived in Jerusa'em bent on 

 missionary work among the na- 

 tives. He had a greater belief in acts 

 than in words. He founded an apiary 

 on old principles on Mt. Zion. After 

 a long and active life he laid down 

 his weary head and now rests, since 

 1896, not more than a hundred yards 

 from his first apiary, in the cemetery 

 near by. His first apiary resembled 

 all apiaries which have existed in the 

 country for the last three thousand 

 years, without a single change. The 

 pear-shaped hives, manufactured in a 

 pottery inside the city walls, had 

 been copied for generations without 

 number, and faithfully reproduced 

 the patterns no doubt imported from 

 Egypt and Assyria by Jews returning 

 from captivity. 



Beekeeping was unknown to the 

 Hebrews before their contact with 

 the ancient civilization on the Nile 

 and Euphrates, as is evident by 

 a passage in Isaiah vii, 17-18: "The 

 Lord shall hiss for the fly that is in 

 the uttermost part of the rivers of 

 Egypt, and for the bee that is in the 



land of Assyria. And they shall come 

 and shall rest, all of them, in desolate 

 valleys, and in the holes of the rocks, 

 and upon all thorns and upon all 

 bushes." Hebrew scriptures talk of 

 the "Land flowing with milk and 

 honey," but the error is only from 

 the translation. Milk, or rather sour 

 milk, the Arabic "Labban," is still a 

 dainty among the natives. As for the 

 Dabsch, translated "honey," the arti- 

 cle is more widely known yet, and 

 called Dibs. This syrup is prepared 

 from the boiled juice of grapes. Dibbs 

 is now made, as in the older days, in 

 great abundance in the magnificent 

 vineyards all around Hebron. 



Nothing has changed in the Land 

 of Promise since the day of Joshua 

 and Caleb, excepting some religious 

 rites. But we meet everywhere the 

 same people, the same names, the 

 same manners, the same way of liv- 

 ing, and, to a great extent, the same 

 language. 



Joshua and Caleb, it is stated, came 

 to the brook Esheol and carried 

 away big clusters of grapes to their 

 astonished tribesmen in the wilder- 

 ness. The Moslem Hebronites of our 

 day raise the luscious fruit in big 

 clusters and offer them for sale in 

 the neighboring villages and as far as 

 Jerusalem. They also boil the grapes 

 into Dibs, on the same spot at Ain- 

 Askala, in the same way as it was 

 done before the Hebrews, in rock- 

 cut presses. "He made him to suck 

 Dabsch (translated honey) out of the 

 rock." Deut. xxxii, 13. 



There is no doubt for me, who was 

 born and grew up amongst the na- 

 tives, that they are the closest and 

 most authentic descendants of Ca- 

 naanites and Hebrews. My plea for 

 them is that when this great war is 

 over they should receive the land 

 promised to them ages ago, a prom- 

 ise now renewed by President Wil- 

 son, to dispose of themselves. Faith- 

 fully they have clung to the native 

 soil, faithfully they have continued 

 the traditions and to them alone it 

 ought to be reserved. 



When I was born, in 18S6, near the 

 walls of El-Kuds-esh-Sharif, the ma- 



Fig. 1. — Jerusalem. 1, city walls; 2. Zion's school; 3 David's grave; 4, Apiary; 5, cemetery 

 6, Miss Baldensperger; 7, Mrs. Baldensperger; 8, H. Baldensperger, Sr., (lived in Terusa' 

 lem 1848 to 1896); 9, Henry Baldensperger. J 



