away of so much wood increases the growth 
of numerous shoots and renders constant 
after-thinning a necessity. When an orchard 
is grazed, the stock naturally lie in the shade 
during hot weather, and of course, the trees 
benefit from the constant evacuations, being 
thicker where the roots gain nourishment. 
1 have tlie present summer some yearling 
heifers lying in the orchard, and they nave 
done most extraordinarily well; for, although 
the pasture is very bare, many people sup¬ 
pose meal or other food is given in addition 
to the grass; at the same time the apples 
or accumulate such an amount of wax upon 
it as to frustrate all her efforts. When the 
old queen has peacefully departed the new 
one is set free. What makes this fact more 
extraordinary is, that usually the workers 
have never seen the birth of a queen or a per¬ 
fect female before ; their hive has known 
but one queen, and yet they anticipate and 
guard against till the dangers likely to arise 
from a second. (Jan it be that these creatures 
do the right thing at the right time con¬ 
sciously by means of any faculty similar to 
our reason. 
KIDNEY WOHMB IN SWINE 
AGASSIZ ON HONEY BEES. 
A correspondent of the National Live 
Stock Journal, commenting upon an article 
previously published in relation to this trouble 
in swine, says In regard to rubbing ‘ pores,' 
open on the inside of a swine’s fore-legs, 
and then filling them with lard, you ask, 
“ What good purpose is served by such a 
process?” Let me say, 1 understand that 
their secretions are not wholly soluble in 
water—even with the addition of soap—but 
that, they may be in lard, or soft grease of 
any kind. In the same way, when our hands 
get pitched or tarred badly, we use lard in 
combination with soap, the two acting to¬ 
gether us a solvent better than either separ¬ 
ately. It is the same with grease heels in 
horses. It is almost impossible to remove 
the secretion with soap and water, but if, 
afltr being washed, a mixture of one part 
verdigris and ten parts lard is rubbed in, 
the scabs fall off in a few hours. And, by 
the way, the mixture. I have made is one of 
the best and safest of all applications for 
grease heels. All this for nothing. 
And now about feeding arsenic to hogs. 
Ilogs, like dogs, •omit readily, and therefore, 
no dose will kill them, except in unusual 
conditions of the stomach. To feed a tea 
spoonful of arsenic is the sheerest folly, ii 
Mr. G. desires to kiU kidney worms, let him 
feed live grains at a time, once a day, for a 
week. Under such a course the system be 
comes arsenteieed, just as after the use of 
FACTS UPON MONEY BEES. 
In a recent lecture Professor Agassiz said, 
in reference to honey bees, the bee hive con¬ 
sists, when iu full activity, of one queen, sev¬ 
eral hundred drones and many thousand 
working bees. These constitute a community 
by which a combined system of labor is car¬ 
ried on transcending in many respects trie 
most complicated actions of man himself. 
Their structure shows no organ similar to 
those by which the mental functions are 
manifested in the higher animals and in man. 
They have no brain proper, nor docs their 
nervous system correspond in any way to 
that of the vertebrates. In all vertebrates 
tiie solid front mass of the nervous system 
which we call the brain is prolonged back 
ward into a long curd, known as the spinal 
marrow, from which many nervous threads 
arise and branch, spreading through the 
whole organization. Tliabrain and the spinal 
TOADS AND BEES, 
F. Glasgow, 8t. Louis Co,, Mo., writes to 
tiie Bee Keepers’ Magazine :—1 have read 
that toads do little or no damage to the bee 
keeper, but I lately found several on the 
front board of my hives, and one J watched, 
and within fifteen minutes saw him cat. four 
Italians and two (lies ; then i executed and 
dissected him, and found Ids stomach per¬ 
fectly crammed with Italian workers. 'lids 
was a very small toad, and I suppose could 
not have had less than twelve bees in liis 
stomach. A toad twice as large would likely 
cut twenty-four bees, and three meals a day 
(1 think 1 am right) makes scveiily- 
two bees for one toad in a day, and a g 
small family of four would make xV 
away with iW8 bees a day. Pretty 
stiff. Perhaps my calculation may rl 
be too high about his three meals a 
day, but I am certain that when a toad finds 
how easy it is to get his meals at t he entrance 
of a bee hive lie won’t look for bugs or 
worms. But the most serious thing they can 
do is to gobble up the young queens in re¬ 
turning home from their bridal trip. Let 
those who ha ve their hives near tlic ground 
look out l’or toads. 
' 
mm 
BKLl’VAIMU8TINU TU1G10 MKABUHKK. 
compare favorably with another orchard not 
grazed, and are better than iu a third one 
which has been mowed. 
Although experience of over twenty years 
in England proves grazing decidedly prefer¬ 
able, yet nearly the same length of observa¬ 
tion ou this continent has failed to allow of 
writing confidently, because there have uot 
been opportunities for proving the good ef¬ 
fects of continued grazing, as the American 
farmers are so given to use the plow on old 
grass to what the English farmers arc. It 
would in- well for farmers to state tlielr ox 
porioneo. in this respect for crops of any kind; 
besides grass is a]it to fail in returning much 
for growing in the shade, and the work of 
cultivation and harvesting Is greater. 
Workengf Farmer. 
SELF-ADJUSTING TREE-MEASURER 
The accompanying illustration shows an 
instrument now used for measuring the bight 
of trees, It is called a ‘‘self adjusting oc¬ 
tant.” it is made of brass, and it will be 
seen that it forms a right-angled triangle, 
two sides of which, A F and F K, are equal ; 
the other side, A 1*J, is furnished with ‘‘a 
sight,” D, exactly like that on the barrel of a 
rillc. A brass pin, (J, is passed through tiie 
plate, at such a point that when the plate is 
balanced ou this piece, between the linger 
and thumb (for which purpose the left hand 
with the knuckles down is found most con¬ 
venient), the. side A F shall be perfectly hori¬ 
zontal, the long edge then falls into an angle 
Of 45" to the horizon, and the observer (allow¬ 
ing the octant to swing Irccly by the piece 
between his finger and thumb) looks along 
the long side, through the hole in the heel 
sight, advancing or retiring till tiie top spray 
of tiie tree is in Hue with the sight. The dis¬ 
tance then from the place where he stands to 
the point vertically beneath the spray, plus 
the bight of his eye from the ground, is 
exactly equal to the bight of the spray from 
Lin- ground, provided ( lie ground is level; 
and on one side or anot her, level ground may 
generally bo selected. 
TRANSFER OF DISEASE FROM CION 
TO STOCK. 
PIG-PEN PAPERS 
Some twelve months ago my attention was 
directed to a tree having golden foliage, 
which surpassed anything of‘the sort I bad 
over seen for richness of color und effect. 
On examination I found it to be a Horae 
Chestnut, evidently suffering from disease, 
caused cither by soil or situation. In July 
last 1 got some buds from it and worked 
them on some young trees, at about three or 
four feet from the ground, a number of which 
have failed ; but, strange to say, many of the 
stocks have produced foliage exactly like 
that of the parent of the cion, though the 
buds themselves are dead. I cannot say 
whether or not the - tucks in which the buds 
are growing arc similarly affected, as It iu 
not usual to let such stocks produce foliage, 
nor can I see any signs of the yellow color in 
the growing buds. My opinion is that many 
of the buds bad not vitality enough to keep 
them alive through the winter, but that dur¬ 
ing their short period of existence they man¬ 
aged in some way to impart the variegation 
to the stock, and that iu case of tiie growing 
buds they may have been more vigorous, and 
by the help of the stock may have outgrown 
the variegation altogether. Another curious 
tiling connected with the matter is (but there 
Milk Killing I/ops. — J. Fuller asks— 
“Will the milk of a new milch cow kill hogs ? 
1 lost one, and know of nothing else that 
could have killed it.” We never knew of an 
instance where wc supposed it had such an 
effect. 
queen, aim some uiousanus oi wonting ooes 
or undeveloped females, some hundreds of 
males or drones. This is the normal combi 
nation in the community, and hives so organ¬ 
ized may survive and keep together for many 
years. There are reports of hives a century 
old. This is, probably an exaggeration, for 
bee hives twenty years old are rare, and they 
do not often survive more than seven, eight 
or perhaps ten years. When 1 speak of the 
life of a bee liivo l do not mean to say that 
tihe individuals eomjiosilig it live together for 
that length of time, indeed, a queen rarely 
lives beyond three or four years ; one of sev 
en yearn is seldom seen, while the males 
never survive the summer in whicli they are 
born, and t he working bees die gradually and 
arc replaced by now ones. But the hive as a 
community holds together for a longer period, 
being constantly renewed by tiie process of 
reproduction, and conies at last like a human 
settlement, to consist of u variety of individ¬ 
uals born at different times. 
QUEEN BEES. 
When a swarm breaks off from an old 
community to form anew colony the division 
is generally due to the appearance of anew 
queen. The queen bee, usually quite con¬ 
tented with her lot, watching over her prog¬ 
eny, active and patient in the care of her 
eggs, furious if a rival arises in the hive. She 
pounces upon her and they sometimes fight, 
to the death. So well is Ibis understood in 
the liivo that the workers take care to pre¬ 
vent such conflicts by holding back the new 
queen just ready to be hatched from her 
royal cell till the bees have swarmed. At 
such a time the workers will stand by the 
coll out of which u queen is to be born, ascer¬ 
tain iiow far her transformation is com¬ 
pleted, and should there be a disposition of 
the young queen shortly to creep out they 
increase the deposit of wax upon the lid 
which shuts the cell, thus preventing the 
egress of the royal prisoner. If she tries to 
break through or attempts to gnaw her way 
out, the workers crowd around the opening 
DIOSCOREA BATATAS 
pupae / Will they endure the climate ol tins 
region ? 1 am of the impression that varie¬ 
ties similar to the sweet potato, in tuber and 
manner of growth, may bo produced, and 
wish to make some experiments.— H. Wan 
ford, Wilson, N. Y. 
We cannot answer our correspondent as to 
where and at what price those plants can he 
obtained. Nor are we certain that they will 
thrive in Niagara Co. We once planted some 
PASTURING ORCHARDS, 
In England almost every orchard Hes in 
permanent grass, and those that ojc annually 
grazed with sheep or only some calves lying 
GARDENER’S NOTES, 
Wages of Gardeners in Neui York .— Peter 
Henderson states that the rates in the vicin 
ity of New York vary for single men from 
to $00 per month and board, and for mar¬ 
ried men from $35 to $75, with house to live 
in. The uverage of the former may be giv¬ 
en us $40 per month and board, of the latter 
at $50 per month and house. The grading of 
price paid of course is in the ratio of ability, 
or amount of charge to be taken. 
il Blue Peter " / Vex.— From live quarts of 
“Blue Peter” 1 shelled two quarts of peas, 
and have peas two inches high to-day (July 
14). from seed raised tins year. Will they 
i-ii.en and be as good to sow next spring as 
Ee from the. first sowing ?- Gardener, 
Greenville, Pa- . - 
We know of no reason why they should 
not. We always depend upon the second 
crop for our seed. 
MONOGRAM. 
with them—and the animals well fed in the 
winter—will give more, fruit and cause the 
trees to prosper better than if cultivated with 
the plow. The droppings and urine from tiie 
live stock, when an orchard is grazed, mature 
Che roots of tiie trees quite as well as the ap¬ 
plication of manure by hauling it thereto. 
There is much less pruning hi farmers’ or 
chards of apple trees, and they last longer, 
which is partly attributable to the climate, 
as the wood grows slower; but the cutting 
MONOGRAM. 
is not the least trace of variegation in tiie 
foliage of any one of the stocks below the 
incision made at. the timo of budding.—//. 
House, in Garden. 
W. H. Ragan, a prominent horticulturist 
of (Jlayton, hid., says tiie Early May or Rich¬ 
mond cherry, worked on Morello stocks, are 
injured much more than those on their own 
roots or on Mahaleb stocks, 
I 
