59 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Mak. 



fortunate as to have earned your poor opinion. 

 Would it not be so mncli better, if we could 

 all avoid sayinji; anything of a i)erson that we 

 would hesitate to say in his presence "i 



A c-ustoaier handed me a watch a few days 

 a<?o with the remark that It had been at my 

 neighbor's shop a number of times, but that he 

 did it no good. I took the watch in silence, 

 but theie at once arose a feeling that I would 

 show him that we did our work promptly and 

 well ; and that he should always come to us in 

 the tirst place. Now ihis was all very well, if 

 it was true, l)ut right before me lay more than 

 one watcii that had been returned under simi- 

 lar circumstances, and that only awaited my 

 personal attention. While I was making the 

 examination he remarked : 



"I guess Mr. does not know much about 



watches any way, does he V" 



I had made up my mind that I would not say 

 anything against my neighbor, oh, no! but 

 there I sat with a soft smile on my face, of 

 superior wisdom, while he went on to make 

 quite frankly the usual remarks to the etfect 

 that he thought such men should never be 

 trusted with^time-pieces, etc., until I began to 

 fee-l ashamed of my cowardly and ungenerous 

 position. I told him the difficulty was a sim- 

 ple oiie, and that I knew Mr. would do it 



.iust as well, and probably at less expense than 

 I could, as the watch was one he had sold. I 

 then took up my own work, with a feeling that 

 I had stoi)ped hurtful gossip, and had spoken 

 of my neighbor as I would be pleased to have 

 him speak of me. Silence at such a time, is 

 frecjuently more damaging to a neighbor, than 

 almost any words we could utter. 



I would by no means be understood as ta- 

 king the position that we should forbear to 

 speak or act, when we sec a neighbor trespas- 

 sing against his fellows, or the laws of our 

 land. For instance, suppose you have a neigh- 

 bor who is making counterfeit money; it is 

 clearly a duty you owe your fellow men, and 

 (^ne that it would be cowardly to evade, to 

 have him speedily stopped ; and if it can not 

 be done otherwise, it must be done by the 

 strong arm of the law, even should you bring 

 unutterable grief and sorrow on his innocent 

 wife and children. Much judgement and wis- 

 dom are required to do work of this nature in 

 the kindest manner possible to all parties con- 

 cerned ; and even the poor culprit should be 

 treated with all the kindness consistent with 

 a llrm discharge of duty. If j'ou should be 

 able to induce him hy appeals to his better 

 self to go back to the safe paths of duty— and 

 such things have been done — you would per- 

 haps be the means of preventing an inestima- 

 ble amount of suffering. And in such an event, 

 you certainly would not think of exposing 

 him after he had ceased from wronging his 

 fellows. But sui)po.sc he will not be honest; 

 in that case, yon may do a great wrong if you 

 fail to do your duty promptly; for it would 

 very likely be a mistaken kindness, even to 

 hiinnelf and his own family. 



I fear it has been a mistaken kindness to 

 i)Oor ]\Irs. Tupper, that prompted the Bee-Jour- 

 nals, our own among the number, to hesitate, 

 when we knew that she was defrauding the 

 bee-keepers of our land. For two or three 



years we have been in possession of facts that 



would have efiectually prevented any one frou> 

 sending her more money ; but as she earnestly 

 promised to pay all up, and as she seemed to 

 be struggling alone and in trouble, we, I cai>- 

 but think unwisely, kept the matter quiet. 

 Had she been treated with the same severity 

 that one of the other sex would have been un- 

 der the same circumstances, it might have 

 saved the money of unsuspecting persons, and 

 have stopped her before she came to her pres- 

 ent awful situation. Even if she had been in 

 sane as has been intimated, there was no rea- 

 son why she should not have been truthfully 

 shown up before the people. 



Be'ore closing this chapter I would revert to 

 another way in which envy and the like pas- 

 sions sometimes show themselves. Has a mer- 

 chant any right to sell his goods at a price that 

 will not pay expenses, if he chooses ? That is, 

 can he do this honestly if the actuating motive 

 is to draw custom from his neighbors':' before 

 you reply be sure that no selfish motive influ- 

 ences you. Put yourself Sfjuarely in the place 

 of one who has but an humble stock, and is 

 struggling hard to get out of debt; nay, sup- 

 pose you are that one, and that you have been 

 forced to acknowledge yourself not as sharp 

 and keen in traffic as your more prosperous op- 

 ponent ; that he with his surplus capital could 

 weather a storm that would wreck your hum 

 ble craft — and thousands have been in just 

 such a place — now what do you think of tin- 

 one who has enough and to spare, and would 

 purposely crush a fellow being':' May God 

 forbid that we, any of us, should ever by pros- 

 perity or any other means, become so hardened 

 as to forget that true happiness in this world, 

 is found not in the money we make, but in tin- 

 good use we make of the talents He has given 

 us; and in rejoicing at the prosperity of oth- 

 ers as well as oui'selves. 



CHAPTER XII. 



Order is Ueavcn's first law. 



"Papa I will you please come and look at the 

 barn ':*" 



What in the world can the boy wish me to 

 come and look at the barn for, was my mental 

 ejaculation as I walked toward it ; and by the 

 way 1 think I will mention to you conflden- 

 tiaily that that i>arn was getting to be a spot 

 to be avoided rather than one about, which 

 fond associations might hover. You see Mrs. 

 R., petitioned for a barn some year or two ago, 

 principally because she would then have some 

 place to put the various traps tha*; lumbered 

 up the woodshed, and which I always objected 

 to having burned up or destroyed. Well, the 

 barn was a luxury Indeed, and it not only an 

 swered as a place for the children to drag in 

 all their treasures, but was also very conveni- 

 ent for storing away discarded beehives that 

 cost too much money to be thrown away. And 

 when we moved the bees to the swamp, thi.' 

 squares of wire cloth were rather hurriedly 

 piled into the barn, and the Quinby honey 

 boxes were also pttt into the barn. And those 

 great big "upper stories" were put into the 

 barn, as also were discarded quilts, part of a 

 bundle of lath that had a fashion of always 

 getting one's feet tangled up, part of a bundle 

 of shingles, some tin division boards, honey 



