December 29, 1870. ] 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



525 



with two colonies which are past all cure, and reserve the 

 others for treatment, hoping that I may find some cure, or at 

 least palliative for the disease, and add my mite of experience, 

 and, perhaps, useful knowledge to our Bee Journal. 



Accordingly, June 8th, the combs of the two condemned 

 colonies were melted into wax, the honey drained over and 

 scalded, and the bees, after a confinement of forty hours, were 

 treated like new swarms, and now, September 18th, aie per- 

 fectly healthy and in fine condition for winter. 



I will not occupy your valuable space with all the details of 

 my experiments and fights (whi^h lasted through three months), 

 with the trials of doses of different strengths and kinds, with 

 old comb and new, with young queens and old ones, and with 

 no queen at all, and how in doing this I was obliged to keep up 

 the strength of the colony for fear of robbers and of spreading 

 the disease to my neighbours, Suffioe it to say that after two 

 months I had made no apparent headway, although still deter- 

 mined to " fight it out on this line, if it took all summer " and 

 my last hive. In fact, I devoted my apiary to the study of 

 this disease, and perhaps death. 



Starting with and holding to the theory that foul brood is 

 contagious only by the diffusion of living germs of feeble 

 vitality (and I was strengthened in my conjecture in micro- 

 scopical examinations, by finding the dead larva? filled with 

 nucleated cells), I determined to try those remedies which 

 have the power of destroying the vitality of these destructive 

 germs, these living organisms, and no remedies seemed to me 

 more potent than carbolic acid and hyposulphate of soda. At 

 first I used both, making one application of each, with an 

 interval of one day, and with apparent benefit ; but attribut- 

 ing the improvement to the more powerful of the two, I 

 abandoned the hyposulphate and used the carbolic acid alone ; 

 and I was so infatuated with the idea of its superiority, that 

 I did not give it up until three of the four hiveB had become 

 so hopelessly diseased that the combs were destroyed, and the 

 colonies treated to new combs (as it was late in the season), 

 and freely fed with sugar and water. These are now in good 

 condition for winter. 



The fourth hive was carried away, the queen caged, and the 

 colony strengthened with a medium-sized second swarm. After 

 all the brood which was advanced had left the cells, I trans- 

 ferred the colony to a clean hive, thoroughly sulphured the old 

 hive with burning sulphur, and stored it away in a safe place 

 for future experiments. I now thought my apiary free from 

 the pest, but on thoroughly examining the whole three new 

 cases of foul brood were found — one very badly affected, and two 

 slightly so, with, perhaps, twenty to forty cells diseased and 

 perforated. 



This was about the 1st of August, and again hyposulphate 

 of soda was selected for the trial, and from the first application 

 I have had the disease under control. Three days ago I ex- 

 amined the three colonies thoroughly, and found no new cells 

 diseased in the two which had been the least affected, and in 

 the almost hopelessly diseased one (as much diseased, in fact, 

 as any of those that I destroyed) an entire brood had been 

 raised, with not over fifty or sixty diseased and perforated 

 cells, with dead larvre remaining, most on one comb, and 

 nearly all the cells contained a new supply of eggs ; this colony 

 is certainly convalescent, and I think now, from the recent and 

 second application of the hyposulphate of soda, is entirely 

 cured. Still, I should not be surprised to find two or three or 

 even more perforated cells after this second crop of brood has 

 hatched, as the whole hive, honey, and comb, had been for so 

 long a time so thoroughly saturated with the disease, and at 

 least two-thirds of the cells had, before the medicine was nsed, 

 been filled with putrid larvae. If so, I shall treat it to a third 

 dose. 



«Now, Mr. Editor, aB it is frequently of as muoh practical im- 

 portance to tell how to administer a remedy as it is to know its 

 name, I will ask your indulgence a little longer, hoping that 

 others may improve upon my remedy, or, at least, test it, if 

 they are so unfortunately ignorant and careless as I was in 

 bringing " the wolf home to the fold." 



The solution of hyposulphate of soda which I used was 1 oz. 

 to half a pint of rain water. With this I thoroughly washed 

 out every diseased cell with an atomiser, after opening the cap, 

 also spraying over the whole of the combs and the inside of 

 the hive. The instrument I use is a spray-producer, invented 

 by Dr. Bigelow, of Boston, and sold by Codman & Shurtleff, of 

 that city. There are two small metallic tubes a few inches 

 long soldered together, and by placing the point of exit of the 

 spray at the lower part of the cell, the whole of the contents of 



the cell are instantly blown out upon the metallic tubes. With a 

 very little practioe there is no necessity for polluting the comb 

 with the putrid matter. Place the comb perfectly upright or a 

 little leaned towards you, and there is no difficulty ; yet if a 

 drop should happen to run down the comb it would do no 

 harm, but had better be carefully absorbed with a pieoe of old 

 dry cotton cloth. I quite frequently do this with the bees on 

 the comb, as it does them no harm, to say the least, to get well 

 covered with the vapour. 



It is not at all injurious to th9 larva after they are two or 

 three days old, though it may be before that time, as I have 

 noticed that after using the hyposulphate where there are eggs 

 and very young larvae, the next day the cells are perfectly clean. 

 There are many interesting points which have come up during 

 my summer's fight, which I would speak of, but I have already 

 gone beyond all reasonable bounds in this communication. — ■ 

 Edward P. Abbe, New Bedford, Mass. 



[The editor of the American Bee Journal, from which 

 the foregoing letter is extracted, directs attention to it in a 

 leading article, in which he declares that " Dr. Abbe deserves 

 the cordial thanks of bee-keepers, both in this country and 

 abroad, for so generously and promptly making known his 

 remedy, and the mode of administering it."] 



COAL-TARRLNG THE ROOF OP A BEE-HOUSE. 



I see in a volume of the old series of the Journal that 

 asphalt is not considered a good thing to cover a bee-house 

 with. I am constructing a new house, and thought of coating 

 the roof, which is of wood, with gas tar. Do you think it would 

 be injurious to the bees? Bee-houses are very useful in our 

 bleak neighbourhood. I leave it open behind, only close it in 

 bad weather with a garden mat. — A Northumberland Bee- 

 keeper. 



[It appears to us that if asphalted felt is objectionable to 

 bees, coal tar must be at least equally so. We should, however, 

 be obliged by the opinions of such of our apiarian readers as 

 may have had experience in the use of both or either of these 

 somewhat mal-odorous materials.] 



Parisian Doings under the Markets. — There is generally 

 something picturesque in the manner in which our confreres 

 on the other side of the channel describe the commonest things ; 

 and, if now and then they draw upon their imaginations for the 

 faots, their mode of expression is their own. A journalist thus 

 describes the vaults of the great Halles Centrales, or market, of 

 Paris : — " The vaults extend under the pavilions of the market, 

 just as an underground warehouse corresponds with the shop 

 above ; and in these vaults, lighted by 1200 gas jets, a multitude 

 of industrious workers purBue their daily avocations. They 

 are : — The compteurs d'ozufs, who count the eggs coming in and 

 going out ; the mircurs, who, with the aid of a candle, investi- 

 gate the autonomy oi each subject ; the preparateurs defromages, 

 who teach the Chester to mellow, the Gruyere to weep, the brie 

 to run, and prick the Roquefort : the rongeurs d'os, who built 

 up their merchandise espalier-wise against the walls, and do a 

 capital business : common bones sell for 5 francs the cwt., but 

 choice bones are worth three times that sum ; the manipulateurs 

 de beurre, whose operations are indispensable for the preser- 

 vation of that delicate article ; the plumeurs, tueurs, and 

 videurs of poultry, who strangle sixty birds per hour, and 

 strip one naked in five minutes or less ; the graveurs de Pigeons, 

 who receive five sous for filling the crops of a dozen Pigeons 

 with grain from their own mouths." There is a poetry, of its 

 kind, in everything. — (Food Journal.) 



OUR LETTER BOX. 



Silver-spangled Hamburgh's Ear-lobes Scabby (A Duffer).— It may 

 be the scab or scurf is the result of frost-bite ; if so, camphor oint- 

 ment is the treatment. If pecked by heDS, remove him- If arising 

 from humour, use compound sulphur ointment. There is no reason why 

 he should not again be exhibited. It is impossible to tell his age ; spur 

 is not infallible as an indication. You need not, and should not shorten 

 the spur, unless the bird scratches his legs or is impeded in walking. 

 Allow him one pullet, or remove him to some place where there will be 

 no temptation to fret. It applies to all birds. 



Silver-spangled Hamburgh Cock's Combs and Ear-lobes (Noviee\ 

 — The comb of a Hamburgh cock should be firmly seated on the head ; 

 should be well forward, but not overhanging the nostrils ; it should have 

 a single pike behind, inclining upwards ; it should be full of points ; it 

 should be even at the base, no hollow in the centre, no inclination to 

 either side ; it should be wider than the skull, and longer than the head, 

 but not greatly so. The ear-lobe of a Hamburgh should be the size of a 



