262 Lixcellencies of Italians. 
The Italians certainly possess the following points of 
superiority: ; 
First. They possess longer tongues, and so can gather 
from flowers which are useless to the black bee. This 
point has already been sufficiently considered. How much 
value hangs upon this structural peculiarity I am unable to 
state. I have frequently seen Italians working on red 
clover. I never saw a black bee thus employed. It is easy 
to see that this might be, at certain times and certain 
seasons, a very material aid. How much of the superior 
storing qualities of the Italians is due to this lengthened 
ligula, Iam unable to say. Mr. J. H. Martin has a very 
ingenious tongue measurer by which the length of the 
tongues of bees in the several hives can be quickly and 
accurately compared. I have made a very simple and con- 
venient instrument to accomplish the same end; two rec- 
tangulat pieces, one of glass and the other of wire gauze, 
are so set in a frame that the glass inclines to the gauze. 
At one end they touch; at the other they are separated 
three-fourths of an inch. Honey is spread on the glass 
and all set in the hive. The bees can only sip the honey 
through the gauze. The bees that clean the glass farthest 
from the end where it touches the gauze have the longest 
tongues. This gives only relative lengths, while Mr. 
Martin’s register tells the absolute length. 
Second. They are more active, and with the same oppor- 
tunities will collect a good deal more honey. This is a 
matter of observation, which I have tested over and over 
again. Yet I will give the figures of another: Mr. Doo- 
little secured from two colonies, 309 lbs. and 301 lbs. 
respectively, of comb honey, during the past season. These 
surprising figures, the best he could give, were from his 
best Italian stocks. Similar testimony comes from Klein 
and Dzierzon over the sea, and from hosts of our own 
apiarists. 
Third. They work earlier and later. This is not only 
true of the day, but of the season. On cool days in spring, 
I have seen the dandelions swarming with Italians, while 
not a black bee was to be seen. On May ‘th, 18747, I 
walked less than half a mile, and counted sixty-eight bees 
