422 THE BEEKEEPERS' REVIEW 



yet very few of us are versed in its study. I feel justified in say- 

 ing that Mr, Cowan is probably the best informed scientific apiarist 

 in existence at the present day. 



Edward Bertrand 



Mr. Bertrand was born in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1832. He 

 is therefore nearly eighty-three years of age. After having re- 

 ceived a thorough education in his native city, he went to England 

 at the age of twenty, where he spent three years, becoming thor- 

 oughly acquainted with the English language. He finally accepted 

 a position with a Paris broker and remained in that occupation 

 until after the Franco-Prussian war of 1870. The worry of the 

 siege and of the Commune upheaval which followed, through a 

 portion of which he was charged with the great responsibility of 

 guarding large funds left in his care, gave him a nervous tension 

 which affected his health and from which he never fully recovered. 

 It was then that he decided to withdraw from active business, re- 

 tire to his home country, in a pretty villa or chalet which he pur- 

 chased on the shore of Lake Geneva, in full view of Mont Blanc, 

 and where he cultivates trees, flowers and bees. He was induced to 

 try bees through the gift from one of his friends of two colonies in 

 straw skeps. 



His beginning in apiculture was a failure. The location on the 

 lake shore was not very favorable, since the bees had only half the 

 scope of pasture which would be secured farther from the water. 

 He tried the local inventions of movable-frame hives, with small 

 frames, then the Berlepsch or German method. 



After many drawbacks, he finally purchased the works of De- 

 Layens and of the elder Dadant, tried their systems, and in 1877 

 his success began. He installed two outapiaries in the mountains 

 of the Canton of Vaud, and another in 1880 in the Jura mountains. 



With the help of one of his pupils, for he was teaching apicul- 

 ture gratis, he established this last mentioned apiary, and finally 

 obtained large crops. A hive on scales at this apiary once showed 

 an increase of 11 kilograms (24.2 pounds), in 24 hours. In 1876 

 he has been elected secretary of the Societe Romande of Apiculture. 

 He was its president at different dates. But as this association, 

 by the terms of its constitution could not retain the same president 

 more than two successive years, he became its treasurer and li- 

 brarian and remained in this office until 1903. 



In 1879, he established, at his own expense, a monthly Bulletin 

 intended as the organ of the above-named association. But this 



