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In the south pavilion of the building will be installed the viticultural exhibit. An idea of how complete this part of the exhibit will be, can be gained from the fact that applications for space have already been received from 33 foreign countries. From abroad the exhibits of France, Germany, Spain and Italy will be especially notable. California will make a splendid display, all the great firms being exhibitors, and having applied for much more space than can possibly be allowed them.

In the rear curtains of the building will be shown the fruit exhibit, which will include all varieties grown in any part of the world. As far as it is possible to do so, probably in a great majority of cases, fine specimens of the natural fruit will be shown. Otherwise wax models, so perfect in appearance as to be indistinguishable from the real fruit, will be substituted. For this exhibit about 44,000 square feet, or more than an entire acre of space, is reserved.

A very complete and splendid exhibit of citrons and other fruits will be sent from California, Florida, Mexico and South American countries. By means of refrigerators, ripe fruit can be sent long distances without injury, and after reaching the Fair, cold-storage facilities will be available to keep it in perfect condition.

The exhibit in the important line of floricuture will be exceptionally extensive, and the preparation of it is far advanced. Unless this were the case, the exhibit could not well be a success, for time is required for the plants to overcome the check received in being transplanted. More than 500,000 transplanted shrubs and plants, of many species, are now growing in the Exposition grounds, and the number is rapidly increasing.

The Department sent out circulars to prominent horticulturists and horticultural societies in all parts of the world, requesting donations of plants, and agreeing to permit the name and address

of the donors to appear in connection with such specimens as they might send. The result is that thousands of plantsexcellent specimens, too-have been forwarded. Among them are more than 50,000 rare rose plants, which have been donated by firms all the way from California to Hungary.

The floricultural exhibit will not be concentrated in one place. In the front curtains of the building will appear the greenhouse and hothouse plants-a very large variety, and many rare and beautiful specimens. There, too, will be the finest display of orchids ever seen in this country, if not in the world. One firm alone will spend $40,000 on its orchid exhibit. At the opening of the Fair, Chief Samuels says, there will be a display of 2,000 different varieties of orchids, embracing 15,000 specimens.

Beneath the great dome will be the largest tropical plants obtainable, including Japanese and Chinese bamboos 75 to 80 feet high, palms 30 to 40 feet high, and tree ferns 15 feet or more in height. There will also be a miniature mountain covered with tropical plants, and in a cave within will be tried the experiments of growing plants by electric light, and of growing them by the aid of electric currents, passed through the soil, both of which, it is claimed, have been accomplished with remarkable results.

The two courts of the Horticultural building will be filled with orange groves from California and Florida, respectively. In each there will be not less than 160 trees, each bearing about 200 bright, ripe oranges. Thus an interesting comparison may be made between the oranges of the two States as to size and flavor, etc. The courts will also contain growing specimens of lemons, limes, bananas, etc. California would like to make a much larger display than will be possible, and applied for about fifty times as much space as could be assigned. It will occupy an acre on Midway Plaisance with a citrus exhibit. On

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the Plaisance, too, five acres will be devoted to nursery exhibit, and Wisconsin will show there a cranberry marsh. acres in front of the Horticultural building will be devoted to the floricultural exhibit, as will also space about many of the larger buildings.

The "wooded island," or as more properly named, perhaps, the flowery island, will be one of the most beautiful and attractive spots at the Exposition. It embraces between 15 and 16 acres, and has been turned over almost entirely to the Horticultural Department for its exhibits. There, literally speaking, will be acres and acres of flowers of brightest and most varied hues and pleasing perfume. Little groves of trees, clumps of shrubbery, and sinuous walks will relieve the gorgeous monotony of this floral display.

On the north end of the island, Japan will build its strange, antique temple, and surround it with the choicest plants and flowers of the island realm of the Mikado. At various turns of the winding walks which thread this delightful domain of the flowers, the visitor will encounter artistic little structures of the summerhouse description, within which one may seat himself and enjoy rest and beauty and perfume. Many of these retreats-16 or 18 in numberwill have thatched roofs, and be covered with growing vines, and otherwise ornamented in keeping with their beautiful surroundings.

In the north pavilion of the Horticultural building will be a very extensive display of vegetables, canned goods, horticultural appliances, etc. In the second story of each pavilion will be a restaurant capable of seating about

200, and profusely adorned with ferns, flowers, and exotic plants. Outside will be a number of greenhouses, where visitors may see an exceptionally complete collection of tropical vegetation. There will also be large auxiliary greenhouses, not open to the general public, where plants will be brought to perfect exhibit

condition, and where plants will be cared for after their beauty season has passed. It may be rightly inferred that the Horticultural exhibit at the Exposition will be the most complete and extensive ever made or attempted. It is certain to attract a great deal of attention, and prove to be of great scientific and educational interest. It will have important features not specified above, as, for example, a very complete collection of insects, both the injurious and the beneficial ones, whose operations affect the fruits and other products of the horticulturist. It is the intention to have in one place an exhibit of all of the species of plants mentioned in the Bible, and in others collections of almost equal historical interest.

Both Chief Samuels, who has general charge of the Horticultural Department, and Chief Thorp, who looks after the floricultural division of the exhibit, have proved themselves to be the right men for their respective duties, and it is already assured that the display which, with the active generous aid of horticulturists the world over, they will furnish, will be long and pleasantly remembered by every one who visits the World's Fair.

Red Raspberry for Honey. -Red raspberries pay well both in nectar for the bees and in fruit. The drooping blossoms protect the honey from moisture, and the bees can work upon them when the weather is so wet that they can obtain nothing from the upright blossoms of the clover. They furnish a succession of flowers during more than three weeks, and yield a supply almost as lasting as the white clover. In favorable seasons the plants supply the table with delicious berries which are more easily gathered than strawberries during as long a time as the plants are in bloom. Where is the farm that cannot afford a few rods of ground on which to raise this luxury ?-Exchange.

Don't Fail to read all of page 821.

Pink-White Glory of Clover.

A pink-white glory of clover, Linking with summer's light; A patch-work gay, all nectar, Makes hills and valleys bright. A pink-white glory of clover, Comes in the rose-set June; When the sky above is bluest, The world with joy a-tune.

A pink-white glory of clover,

Out-lasting summer flowers; The roses, blooming and fading, To autumn's chill, dark hours.

A pink-white glory of clover,

Going only with the leaves; With the fall of the maples' crimson, The binding of the sheaves.

-FLORENCE CARR.

Queries and Replies.

Bees and Grafting-Wax on Trees.

QUERY 824.-What can be done to prevent bees from taking grafting-wax off from trees where grafting has been done? My bees took off the wax and destroyed several cions last Spring.Michigan.

Tie cloth over it.-C. C. MILLER. Wrap rags around it.-M. MAHIN. Cover it with cloth.-H. D. CUTTING. Wind rags around the wax.-JAMES A. GREEN.

Tie cloth over the wax.-G. M. Doo

LITTLE.

Wrap them with rags.-J. M. HAM

BAUGH.

Tie a cloth over the wax.-MRS. J. N. HEATER.

Try rubbing a little cerasin on the grafting-wax.-C. H. DIBBERN.

Wind the wax with cloth. I think that would protect it.-A. J. COOK.

Make the grafting-wax harder; or else put muzzles on the bees.-A. B. MASON.

Look up a recipe for making graftingwax that requires less beeswax.-P. H. ELWOOD.

I give it up. Tell me. May be the wax could be scented and flavored with

something that would disgust the "little varmints."-JAMES HEDDON.

I would suggest wrapping a cloth over the waxed part of the graft.-J. P. H. BROWN.

Covering the wax with a piece of cotton-cloth would prevent it, I think.R. L. TAYLOR.

Press on with the hands some strong paper, to cover the wax; the paper will stick to the wax.-E. FRANCE.

Nothing that I know of. They probably find a scarcity of propolis, and take it as a substitute.-J. E. POND.

Why not cover the grafting-wax with strips of cloth, or other material, to keep off the bees ?-G. L. TINKER.

I really do not know. I have never heard of a similar case. Was it not because the bees had nothing else to do? -EUGENE SECOR.

Wrap thin muslin around the stock where the wax is. If your grafting-wax is of the proper proportions, I do not think it will get soft enough for the bees to handle.-MRS. L. HARRISON.

What can be done to keep the rabbits from gnawing young trees? Why, protect them. So protect the wax by tying rags or something else around it. You know a woman would say rags," every time.-MRS. JENNIE ATCHLEY.

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I don't know. I do some grafting every year or so, and I have never been troubled by bees. But if my bees were to carry away the wax from grafted stocks, I would bandage them with tissue paper or thin rags, to exclude the bees from the wax.-G. W. DEMAREE.

Protect the grafted trees by wrapping cloth or stout paper over the graftingwax.-EDITORS.

A Year's Numbers of the AMERCIAN BEE JOURNAL contain over 1,650 pages-what a wonderful amount of bee-literature for only $1.00! Could you afford to do without it at that price -2 cents per week? Send us the names and addresses of your bee-keeping friends, who do not receive the BEE JOURNAL, and we will mail them sample copies. We want every bee-keeper in the land to see it, and know of its value as an "assistant" in the apiary.

Topics of Interest.

"Standard for Italian Bees."

G. M. DOOLITTLE.

Under the above heading, on page 255, Mr. Thos. Johnson seems to think that I made "a weak statement" in saying at the Albany Convention that I "was satisfied that the Italian bee was a hybrid ;" and as proof to show why he thinks that statement weak, he cites to us thoroughbred Hereford and Shorthorn cattle.

I may have erred in saying "hybrid" instead of thoroughbred, yet I am not entirely sure of this. If hybrid means only the first cross between fixed races, when applied to bees, then I was wrong; but if it means the mixing and inter-mixing of races, until we have a conglomeration of different varieties, which have been bred in one direction so long that they sport but little, or what is termed by some thoroughbred," then I was right.

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Most of those who write on apiculture, use the term "hybrid" in the latter sense, if I "read between the lines" aright, and this was the sense in which I used the term "hybrid," which Mr. Johnson takes exception to. I was not fighting the term "thoroughbred," but I was standing against the few who claim that the Italian bee is a fixed race, or as the term goes, "a pure bee."

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With all the testimony which we have had that there are black bees in Italy, and with all the sporting and inconstancy of color which we have seen while breeding these bees in this country, it seems strange to me that there are some who will persist in calling these bees pure," or belonging to a fixed race. "" Capt. Balstein told us years ago that "no Chinese walls of snow-clad Alps" had kept the different races of bees from intermingling in the sunny clime of Italy; and nearly all who have since visited that country, have given us a similar report.

Mr. Johnson is right, where he says, "The way to establish uniformity in Italians would be in their color," for we have no other criterion to go by.

But what shall that uniformity of color be? The Roots, of Ohio, claim that the dark, leather-colored bees (so nearly black that it is hard work to distinguish them from our native bees, only as they are filled with honey and placed

on a window), which some of their imported Italian queens produce, are just as much Italian, and just as good honeygatherers as are those imported queens which are a nice yellow color, and produce bees of the same consistency.

Others, like Messrs. Timpe, Hearn, Trego, etc., claim that the standard should be bees whose abdomens, not only of the queens, but of the workers, are nearly or quite an entire yellow; for these bees, it is claimed, have all the good qualities which go toward making Apis Americana, with the quality of color thrown in.

I see Mr. Robbins is trying to make the standard for Illinois "three yellow bands," claiming that bees showing these are the best and most prolific of any in the known world. Will Mr. Johnson swing his State of Iowa into line? and if so, which line will he swing it into that of the Roots', the Timpe's, or the Robbins'?

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It looks to me very much as if this was a "hybrid question through and through, when we come to decide on a standard for color, and I agree that COLOR can and must be the only standard which can be fixed upon. In the Good Book we find (Genesis 30, 27-43) how one became rich out of a diversity of color in the flocks and herds which he cared for, and we find this color bearing, almost as important to-day as it was then; but instead of our desiring to increase those which are "ring-straked, speckled and spotted," we are desirous of producing something having a uniformity of color, for by this means some may reach a prominence above that of their more careless and slipshod neighbors.

Chickens are bred "to the feather," yet none of these fancy fowls can claim that they were the original race. No, no. All they can claim is that through a long series of breeding they are what they are. And this is what I clam for the Italian bee, and I cannot, for the life of me, see why this should make it any the less valuable, any more than the breeding "to the feather" of poultry should make them less valuable.

All know that this breeding of poultry makes the poultry more valuable, and yet we have those among our number who would claim that all the painstaking of our most enterprising breeders of the Italian bee should count for naught, yea, worse than naught, for say they, this can only be arrived at through a series of in-and-in breeding, and this begets weakness, unprolificness and laziness.

I have often wondered why such as this should be thrown in the progressive queen-breeder's face, while the same men will sound abroad the praises of our progressive cattle, sheep, swine, and poultry breeders. Do not these men

know that it would be much easier for a queen-breeder to send out queens whose progeny would run from the dark Italians of the Roots, to the five-banded bees of some of our most progressive breeders ? And that such bees as these would need no guarantee of any kind, and could be easily reared even by the novice?

Why not go back to the herds and flocks of our forefathers, and claim that the old razor-backed hog from the woods was hardier and better than our round, fat, sleek Berkshires and Suffolks? This would be just as consistent as is much of the talk about the black bees, and those imported direct from Italy," being superior to those from our best breeders; for, say these talkers, "as beauty increases, superior quality decreases."

From the foregoing I think Mr. Johnson will see that when he comes to try to establish a uniformity of color, and keep a registry of queens bred to a certain standard, he will have as big an "elephant on his hands" as have those who have been trying to establish a uniform standard for sections.

Borodino, N. Y.

Basswood Trees, Italians and Dandelions.

J. C. LILLIBRIDGE.

I wish to thank the BEE JOURNAL and the friends for their kind answers to my questions about basswood trees. I have since found out that they do blossom when quite young, right here at home, when in a cultivated field, at least.

Mr. Judkins, on page 615, would seem to intimate that we have very little basswood, but I think if at the time he was here he had followed some of the small streams up from one to five miles from the river, he would have found among the timber in the valleys quite a sprinkling of basswood trees. But it is fast disappearing now, as well as our hemlock. Much of it has been used for lumber, and three "heading factories have been started in this vicinity to use up that not good for lumber. Now there is talk of starting a wood-pulp factory, to use up the balance.

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younger trees. If they will bear so quickly as the second growth, together with our thousands of acres of wild raspberries and white clover on waste lands, with plenty of aspen, willow, elm, maple, dandelion and fruit blossom to build up on, and lots of golden-rod, asters, and other wild flowers, it will make a honey locality hard to beat in the East.

ITALIAN BEES.

May there not be something in the theory of Mr. J. M. Pratt, on page 638, that the brood-combs of black bees produce inferior Italian bees? Perhaps this letter may draw out some one else.

Our bees are doing well at present, when it does not rain, which is most of the time.

DANDELION AS A HONEY-PLANT.

I wonder if dandelions do as well everywhere as they do here. They have been in bloom now since April 25, and the bees almost desert the fruit-bloom for them during the four or five hours they last each day.

I am keeping a record of what my bees work on each day, and would like to compare notes with some one who is doing the same, at the end of the season. Port Allegany, Pa., June 1, 1892.

The Paddock Pure Food Bill.

J. A. NASH.

We are specialists in the production of extracted honey, and have watched with interest, not entirely unmixed with disgust, the action of many newspapers in their oppostion of the Bill bearing the above title.

We find that some of the very worst opposition to this measure comes from the papers that contain the most patent medicine advertisements. The patent medicine men have taken alarm, lest the section relating to adulteration of drugs should make them trouble. This is singular, as a careful reading of the Bill fails to disclose anything at all injurious to these people, who are badly alarmed before they are hurt.

They seem to fear that it will compel them to disclose their formulas; this, however, is far from the intention of the bill, as it expressly provides (see Sec. 6), "That nothing in this Act shall be construed as requiring or compelling proprietors or manufacturers of proprietary medicines to disclose their formulas."

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