The question has been asked “Are we drifting from our moorings.” I used
to think that we should not, but if all bee-keepers anchored to one idea
there would be no improvements. While it is safe to our own pockets to
be conservative, yet no class has done more to advance the interests of
the bee-keepers than those who experiment, and seem not to be satisfied
with their present condition. Had the inventors of the Monitor been
contented with wooden war ships our great American Republic would have
been divided. Had we all been content with stage coaches where would our
railroads have been? Had Edison preferred to sit at his telegraph
instrument we should now be without his master ideas. This onward
impelling force in Americans has sought out so many good things in the
last fifty years that I have not space to tell them. Some rejoice in
real improvements. Well, we can’t grind out out a grist of real
improvements to order. We have many discouragements and losses before
we succeed in turning out one. Many of these inventions must be tested
by bee-keepers before a true verdict can be given, and we should all be
willing to lend a hand to be one of the great jury in the discussion of
these cases as they are brought before us by our leaders; the inventors.
Yet while the tester goes hand and hand with the inventor, each watching
the others movements, each helping the other to discover and rectify
mistakes. It is too true that many good inventions have been swamped and
for years laid dormant when they might have been in use, simply for the
lack of wisdom to guide us to small experiments first. Yes, there seems
to be too much rush, new things can’t be tested in a hurry. To change an
average apiary all at once to some new mode of management, or new style
of hive, even if the hives were given to us, would be unwise. But add
the cost of hives and fixtures which the change involves with the loss
which one is sure to meet with for a time under any new arrangement, and
can we wonder that there is so little confidence placed in inventions or
the inventors. Still had we gone more slowly, tested more carefully, and
on a smaller scale and given ourselves more time to sum up the evidence,
no doubt many times our verdict would bless instead of curse the
inventor. No doubt there are inventors who abuse one’s confidence, but
they too well have but little chance to deceive us if we go slow. We can
change too much, and again too little. I am aware that I have missed
some good opportunities by being a little too set in my ways, and I
have had too little charity for improvements; medium ground is safe
ground on which to stand. We should watch the signs of the times and not
jump conclusions, nor bite at all that takes our fancy, nor kick at all
that we despise, we ought always to review, draw conclusions and watch
very closely what the mass of bee-keepers seem to favor, or decide upon.
If we are good readers of indications we need never get left, and often
can go across lots, thus reaching the head of the procession, but be
sure we know the way across else better we had gone around.
_Ovid, Erie County, Pa._
What I Have Observed, Etc.