GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



July 



the edze of the fdn. into it with a stiff butcher 

 knife. The w.iod of the frames I now plane smootli 

 all around and aaint on the outside, the inside of 

 the hive bein^' treated in the same manner. With 

 the metal corners and rabbets and an enameled 

 sheet over the frames in addition, I think we have 

 little further need of improvements to facilitate the 

 tnaiiipul itions of the interior of a Lawn hive. 



Feeding bees is like comb fdn. ; the more I see of 

 it the bitter I like it. 1 use g'rape sug'ar for 

 feeding'. Fruit bloom was very plentiful the pres- 

 ent season, so I ceased feeding, thinking- it would 

 oarry the bees to white clover; but the last of May 

 I found two hives with an unusual number of dead 

 bess at the entrance, and, on examination, I found 

 them in a starving condition. I immediately gave 

 them frames of comb containing honey. The rest of 

 the bees discovered it, and were ravenous for a part 

 of it. On a further examination, I found the rest 

 nearly as bad off. They had killed off their drones, 

 and instead of bein? ready to swarm, had nearly 

 stopped breeding. If, as you say, they will not take 

 sugar syrup when honey is plenty in the fields, it 

 S3ems 1 1 me good policy to let them have access to 

 it at all times. But I have not yet found a time, 

 when they tlew freely, that they would not carry 

 syrup of grape sugar to some extent. 



DRONES FROM VIRGIN QUEENS 



I have some interest in, having an Italian queen 

 of that kind. W. S. Boyd's letter, on page 195. June 

 number, casts doubt on their usefulness, yuinby 

 siys (page 37), "I have frequentlj% since obtaining 

 the Italian, reared (jueens intentionally late in the 

 season, that I might have drone-laying queens for 

 the purpose of raising early drones." Cook speaks 

 of drones from virgin queens, in connection with 

 others, as though he considered them equally effect- 

 ive. If the generally received theory of their 

 origin is cirrect, they should be as good as any. 

 Yet, except for the purpose Quinby mentions, it 

 don't seem good economy to have queens that can- 

 n >t I ly a ly but drone eggs, when they can just as 

 well lay both kinds. 



• OUR HOMES 



In the June number of Gleanings, leads me to 

 tike your part, against White's suggestion of leav- 

 ing all religious matter for sectarian or especially 

 religious papers; as though honest Hebrews, Cath- 

 olics, and Freethinkers did not, as a rule, do good 

 works in their every day life. Sectarian questions 

 may bsst be discussed in sectarian papers; but in 

 all the home papers I have read, I think it would be 

 difficult to come to a certain conclusion as to what 

 particular sect or creed you believed in or belonged 

 to. In this age and country, most of us are Free- 

 thinkers, whether we belong to a religious body or 

 not; and it is this free thought and the liberty of 

 free action, so long as the actions do no positive 

 harm to us or our fellows, that constitutes the great 

 advancement this generation enjoys over previous 

 ones. The main object of the Home Papers, it 

 seems to me, is to have us so control and limit our 

 acts that they shall do the least harm and the most 

 good; and they show us how to do this in practice, 

 not in theory merely. Many times this can best be 

 done by associated effort among the masses, leaving 

 speculative theories to take care of themselves. 

 So far as my knowledge extends, "Our Homes" 

 are read by all whether religious professors or not, 

 without a word of objection to the place they are 

 published in; and probably nine out of every ten of 

 their readers would never see them, if published in 

 a sectarian paper. D. C. LTnderhill. 



Seneca, Ills., June lOtb, 1878. 



The April, May, and June Gi/Eanings are now 

 gone, and we are obliged to offer Kk- a piece for 

 them, as we did for the Jan., Feb., and March No's. 

 To prevent such a catastrophe again, we are print- 

 inu- (iOOO of the July No's. For the whole of the 

 abo\e six No's of this year, we will pay 7.5c, or sell 

 them for .-pi.OO. You see you pay TjOc for them, and 

 then sell them for 75c, after you have read them. 

 Is not that a good speculation? 



"A NEWLY imported Hungarian, employed on a 

 farm a few miles north of the city, lifted up a bee- 

 hive the (»ther day to see what the bees were doing 

 under there. He knows now. He says the v were 

 making chain lightning and had 2,000 tons of it on 

 hand, which exploded before he had time to let the 

 box ilown." -Hawk-Eye. 



GLEANINGS tNBEE CULTURE. 



EDITOR AND FUBLISHEB, 



MEDINA, OHIO. 



terms: $1.00 per year, i»ost-paii>. 



I^/IE3DIlSr-A., J-TJUr^ 1, ISTS. 



Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew 

 thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest 

 not.— Jeremiah 3;j; 3. 



"N.ARY a word," have we heard from, or of , our 

 friend Perrine since he started. 



When everything is just right, hives all in readi- 

 ness, plenty of frames, fdn., section boxes, and 

 plenty of help to do the work, I tell you it is just 

 fun, to take charge of 200 colonies in the month of 

 June. 



And now, friend Alley offers to send queens, and 

 you are not to pay a cent, until you get them. It" 

 that is not fair, I don't know what is. Mj' friends, 

 will you not be as magnanimous, and be sure that 

 he has his money, just the minute you get your 

 queen? even if she is not all you expected, and as 

 large as some of you have seen, send him his moiicfj, 

 even before j'ou get her introduced ; for a queen 

 rearer has many a trial and disapjwintment which 

 you may know nothing of. Think gently, and 

 speak gentlj^ of —the man who raises queens for sale. 



Some one in the A. B. J. asks me to "rise and ex- 

 plain" how that wax fell short. Friend Bureh sta- 

 ted it exactly, in saying one of the clerks made a. 

 mistake of 10 lbs. in weighing it, and as the shipper 

 did not give the amount that there should have 

 been, I had no means of discovering the fact, until 

 informed there should have been 10 lbs. more. If I 

 were obliged individually to weigh all the wax sent 

 in, beside attending to my other duties, I fear I 

 should go crazy sure. When a box of wax is re- 

 ceived the gross weight is always marked on it. 

 After the box is emptied, the weight of the box is 

 written under and subtracted. In the case men- 

 tioned, when the box was hunted up the figures 

 showed a mistake had been made in subtracting. 



Thi? letter in our last number objecting to the 

 Home Papers has called forth a great amount of 

 correspondence on the subject. Three persons 

 among the lot have taken the same, or a similar 

 ground, with friend White; all the rest have ex- 

 pressed a desire to have them continued. As the 

 latter are greatly in the excess, and among them are 

 many who do not favor religion or the Bible at all, 

 shall we not consult the wishes of the greatest 

 number, and go on? I sincerely thank those who 

 have stated their objections, for the remembrance 

 of their words will, without doubt, prove a whole- 

 some check upon me, when I am disposed to get out 

 of the narrow path in which I feel my work should 

 be done. In case I should stray a little, unwisely, 

 will you not all bo lenient with your friend? I feel 

 free to ask this, because the Home Papers are, and 

 always have been, given gratis; in computing how 

 large a journal I can give you for $1.00, they are 

 ncA'er taken into account. I trj^ hard to make the 

 journal worth $1.00, aside from them. 



