22 
MANAGEMENT OF HONEY EEES.-NO. 15 . 
with an active population, busily engaged in other 
mechanical operations than the United States 
armory which, however, supplies a large share of 
the occupation of its citizens. 
The following morning found us toiling up the 
mountains, which had been favored by quite a fall 
of snow, that now lay in scattered ridges through 
the fields and woods. They were cultivated to 
their tops, which here seemed neither rugged nor 
high. Even buildings, in close proximity, line the 
road to their summits. Laurel Hill, which is the 
last of these mountains, and seems rather a de¬ 
tached or isolated spur than a continuous chain, is 
an exception in cultivation. Its high, abrupt sides, 
which are surmounted by a gently winding but not 
sleep ascent on either side, are too forbidding to 
have tempted the agriculturist hitherto; and they 
have been suffered to retain all the primitive wild¬ 
ness they exhibited to the eye of the youthful 
Washington, when he first led the hardy military 
p'oneers across them, to vindicate the Anglo-Saxon 
slaim to the valley of the Mississippi. What a re¬ 
sult has followed this small beginning. Ere a 
century rolls around, more than 10,000,000 of 
that indomitable race wall have become occupants 
of the soil then trod solely by the red man, the 
Spaniard, and the Gaul. This will be but the nu¬ 
cleus of a population yet destined to occupy a coun¬ 
try, for its extent and uniform fertility, nowhere 
equalled on the face of the globe. 
From the summit of Laurel Hill, in passing -west¬ 
ward, the eye first rests on the fertile valley of the 
Monongahela. Apparently at our feet, but really 
some five miles distant, arises the pretty village of 
Uniontown. Around, and beyond it, as far as the 
vision extends, lie the green cultivated fields, or the 
brown-tinted forest, rising in a mingled succession 
of beautiful waves • and as the soft light and sha¬ 
dows incident to an Indian summer’s sun lay over 
this wide-spread, billowy landscape, I thought it a 
combination of beauty and grandeur rarely if ever sur¬ 
passed. In one of the open fields below, surround¬ 
ed by a high but dilapidated paling, is shown the 
grave of Braddock. To this point he was brought 
after receiving his fatal wound near fort Du 
Quesne, and buried in a concealed grave in their 
military road, to avoid exposure to the Indians. 
Thus fell a rash, conceited, headstrong man, whose 
vanity, stupidity, and pride (too often characteris¬ 
tic of men in power), brought murder and devasta¬ 
tion on the helpless frontier settlements for years 
succeeding. 
Innumerable droves of swine filled the roads be¬ 
tween Cumberland and Morristown. They are 
generally reared in the southwestern part of Penn¬ 
sylvania, and driven to the former place, and there 
shipped on to the cars for Baltimore. They were 
mostly in moderate condition, and many of them 
what may be estimated as only good stock hogs, 
and in a proper state to take on fat advantageously. 
There is much waste in stopping at this point in 
the fattening of swine, as the greatest profit con¬ 
sists in carrying them rapidly forward to the highest 
point oi maturity. The present leanness, however, 
where the animal has to be driven a long distance, 
is in a measure unavoidable. There is always a loss 
in driving a fat animal beyond his yard for slaughter. 
I noth'ed a considerable proportion of Berkshires 
among these droves, and had no idea they had made 
so much progress in this section. They were 
easily distinguishable in form and appearance, ex¬ 
clusive of color; and wherever they or their crosses 
were seen, I was sure to note good animals, 
generally the best in the herds, though there were 
a large proportion of good swine among them. 
Pittsburg , Nov. 18, 1847. 
MANAGEMENT OF HONEY BEES.—No. 15. 
Drones , their Uses , fyc. —Before I close my re¬ 
marks upon the management of honey bees, with¬ 
out attempting to touch upon the natural history 
or physiology of this insect as it requires, I shall 
say a few words, relative to the nature and uses of 
drones , in connection with the queen and workers, 
which constitute the whole family of a colony of 
honey bees. The queen is the mother of the en¬ 
tire increase of every hive, and it is her sphere and 
duty, to deposit all the eggs, amounting to some 
60,000 or 70,000 annually. She, in her wisdom, 
is the author of the specific number of drones ne¬ 
cessary to a hive, and the workers, at her command, 
construct the proper cells for drones. They also 
construct all other cells, and nurse the young 
brood through every stage of infancy, till they are 
able to help themselves ; and it is also their duty 
to gather all the stores of the colony. 
The drones appear to be a superfluous legion, of 
no use at all; but rather a disadvantage. This 
class of the honey bee derive their name from 
their general lazy habits, spending their time in 
luxury, and feeding upon the stores gathered by 
the ever industrious workers. They are never 
seen to alight upon any flower, or doing anything 
to aid the prosperity of the colony. In one respect 
they are entirely different from the workers, having 
the liberty of entering different hives with perfect 
impunity, while a worker enters any hive but its 
own at the peril of its life. The drones are found 
to compare in numbers with the workers, as about 
one to twenty. Now, the question is, what are these 
apparently useless bees for \ Would not our apia¬ 
ries be generally benefited, could we banish these 
lazy drones from our hives I This may reasona¬ 
bly seem to be the case to one who has not become 
familiar with the natural history of the honey bee ; 
but should we banish these bees from our hives, 
depopulation would speedily follow. 
However mysterious the ways of animate nature 
may appear, nothing is created in vain. Nature, 
in order to ensure her legitimate objects of fructifi¬ 
cation, is ever profuse, often far exceeding the posi¬ 
tive requirements of the case, as we may view it; 
but, after all, nature is right, and we are wrong. Look 
lor instance, to the fructifying farina of the tassel of 
maize, that contains a thousand times the quantity 
that is necessary to give birth to the ears that brace 
each stalk around. The captious and precarious 
winds that are commissioned to waft this farina to 
its destiny, are not to be relied upon, hence the vast 
superabundance that nature has provided to render 
fertility sure. Not unlike this, is the legion of 
drones that lazily hang around our hives ; and 
where a thousand exist, nine hundred and ninety- 
nine are perfectly useless, save upon the same prin¬ 
ciple of superabundance as shown forth above. The 
only object for which drones are brought into exist- 
