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man, woman and child in the United States. Doubtless, however, this was. an absurdly low estimate.

When, soon afterward, the scientific expedition did at last set out, it could not find a single tile fish alive. Every means of

capture was tried in vain, the indication being that the species had actually been rendered extinct!

Even to this day nobody knows what the cause of the catastrophe was. It was at first attributed to a volcanic disturbance at the bottom of the ocean. Since then, however, a theory has come to be more widely accepted to the effect that the

GATHERING NEW MARINE CROPS

57

tile fish for ten years, though efforts were repeatedly made to find it. In 1892, however, while the Fisheries Bureau vessel Grampus was pulling up some trawl lines south of Nantucket, a living specimen of the lost tribe was actually found struggling on one of the hooks! Only one was caught, but the discovery was hailed with utmost delight, because it proved that the species was not extinct after all. On other trips half-adozen more were captured the females ripe with roe, showing that reproduction was going on. Inasmuch as this fish is evidently very fecund, and probably has few enemies to fear, being itself of large size and rather fierce, there would naturally be expectation of its rapid multiplication.

[graphic]

A HALIBUT FRESH-TAKEN BY THE FISHER. Halibut is growing scarce in the North Atlantic. The North Pacific is now furnishing the greater quantity.

encroachment of a current of cold water from the Polar regions upon the feeding grounds occupied by the tile fish brought about the calamity.

Mention has already been made of the relatively steep declivity which, descending to the deeper sea-floor, marks the true edge of the continent. A broad belt along this declivity is bathed by a current of warm water from the Tropics. It is not the Gulf Stream (which is a surface current), but a warm river running down below. The tile fish, which is a tropical animal (accounting for the remarkable brilliancy of its coloration), finds its way northward along this warm belt of bottom. But it so happened, late in the winter of 1882, that a chilly current from the Arctic invaded the belt and froze all the tile fish that were in those waters to death.

Whether this theory be correct or not, it is certain that nothing was seen of the

Inasmuch as the species in that portion of the warm belt which lies south of the mouth of the Delaware did not suffer at all presumably from the catastrophe described, it would be likely soon to repopulate its northern feeding grounds, when former conditions were restored. Presumably it is today as abundant on those grounds as ever, and might be obtained thence in numbers equal to the cod, if beam-trawls were employed for its capture. It is a more desirable fish than the cod, being more delicate and of a better flavor. Inasmuch as the fishing grounds are only from sixty to one hundred miles off shore, fishermen could readily carry the tile fish in a fresh condition, on ice, to New York, Boston, and Philadelphia.

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D'

ETERMINED to benefit by the work of others while she worked herself, Miss Margaret Kehoe, a stenographer in an office building in Vine Street, Philadelphia, hit upon the plan of starting an apiary on the roof. It was a roof that lent itself readily to the idea and with the consent of the owners of the building Miss Kehoe installed her bee hives. Now there is a thriving colony of honey-makers busily engaged in gathering honey and storing it for the benefit of the clever little girl who originated the idea.

Very few of the office workers in the neighborhood know of the existence of this roof apiary. The roof is not overlooked by other buildings and as adjoining roofs are not visited by the tenants the apiary established by Miss Kehoe is not interfered with and no one is the wiser for the innovation. The bees give very little trouble. As any one knows who has possessed an apiary the little collectors go about their business day by day and require no attention. They feed themselves, manage their own affairs and ask only to be let alone to toil the merry day through. If they realize that the honey they are so industriously storing is

to benefit the owner of the hive and not the bees themselves they don't let the knowledge trouble them or interfere with their daily program.

The keeping of bees being one of the profitable experiments that can be undertaken without any great effort, at slight expense and with scarcely any labor involved, the originator of the roof apiary finds it no tax on her time or her resources to manage the little honey business she has established.

The only outfit required in starting an apiary of this kind is a hive or two, a colony or two of Italian bees, a veil, a smoker and a little practical knowledge added to the book learning that any one can acquire from a volume borrowed from a library. The apiary can be started with a capital of twenty-five or thirty dollars and if you have no roof on which to keep the hives, and no back yard they can be kept on the porch. As the popular idea of bees, however, is that they are vicious little insects, given to sting on sight and at times showing a fiendish desire to attack in a body, it is well to start the apiary as Miss Kehoe did, out of sight of every one and where there can be no possibility of interference with the industrious little bees.

[graphic]

ONE OF THE BUSIEST OF THE HIVES.

MISS MARGARET KEHOE ALLOWING BEES TO CLUSTER
ON HER BARE ARMS TO SHOW HOW
GENTLE THEY ARE.

Miss Kehoe has only been familiar with the habits of bees for a few months, but she has entirely lost all fear of them and has learned that the popular idea of the viciousness of the bee is entirely wrong. To prove this she permitted two clusters of bees to swarm on her arms and in one of the pictures she can be seen with the masses of bees held in this way, smiling at the camera, not the least bit nervous and confident that the bees would be gentle with her, as indeed they were.

It would not be possible to take these liberties with the old time black or hybrid bees. But the advance made in the bee keeping industry includes the importation of the Italian bee, a much more gentle variety than the older kind. The Italian bee will not sting unless driven to do it in defense of his home and his honey. Miss Kehoe wears a veil sometimes when working around the hives, but at times she works entirely without this protection and is never stung. In fact she wears the veil more to keep the swarms of flying bees from her face and eyes than from any fear of harm from them. There is also, she declares, a great deal of exaggeration concerning the harm done by the sting of a bee. If brushed off quickly the bee sting, which is left in the wound with its store of poison, is harmless. The

mistake made is to try to pick the little sting out with the thumb and finger. In squeezing it this way the poison is pressed in and the very object that is

to be avoided is accomplished.

It may be expected that Miss Kehoe will duplicate the experience of another city bee keeper who writes:

"Began the season with three colonies; divided and swarmed to nine and took 362 sections of fine honey late in the fall. I have spent about $100 since beginning, but now have nine good swarms, 25 supers and three empty hives with everything complete and the outfit is worth over $200. Altogether I have taken 622 sections of honey of which $115 worth has been sold. All my honey sells for 25 cents per section and I sell out as fast as I can deliver it."

It should be remembered when comparing the plan of bee keeping with that of chicken raising or any of the kindred ideas that the suburbanite or city dweller has for raising money, that the bees require no feeding, they shift for themselves all the time, they are working for you every day without any cost to you, they take up little room in the establishment, are not likely to get you "in wrong" with the neighbors, if properly placed as these of Miss Kehoe's are, and the initial outlay is scarcely anything.

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The

W

Stoker

AY down below the lower deck an' just above the keel

Our stoke-hole crew they tramps around on hard and smokin' steel, Right in a glare that makes you blind, a heat that makes you reel,

We feeds the blazin' boilers day an' night,

We're red of eye an' black with coal an' though the shift is short,
The sweat of workin' in that hell is measured by the quart,
This stokin' liners' boilers ain't no mollycoddle sport

But we gotta keep the boat a-goin' right.

It's shovel, shovel, shovel!

An' it's sweat, sweat, sweat!

With the heat a whoopin' round you
An' yer hull frame wet;
With the cinders all a-droppin'

An' the grates a-roar,

As they seem to yell for fuel

Sayin' "More! More! More!"

The Captain on the windy bridge is something grand to see,
An' the Engineer's a personage as great as he can be,
But the tub would never travel if it weren't fer mugs like me,
The guys you never know is on the ship,

If we didn't keep on stokin' spite of all the sweat an' stew,
If we didn't feed the boilers what the devil would they do?
There wouldn't be no power for to turn the bloomin' screw
An' there wouldn't be no record-breakin' trip!

It's shovel, shovel, shovel!

An' it's sweat, sweat, sweat!
We're tryin' to cut the record

An' we'll do it yet,

While the draft would almost suck you

Through the furnace door,

An' the hungry grates is callin'

"Give us more, more, more!"

They packs us down in quarters that a Chink would hardly bear, An' now an' then they condescends to let us breathe the air (When the passengers ain't lookin' an' there ain't a soul to care;)

So we sweats our lives in service to the Line,

An' in payment for our labors we gits mighty little pay,
An' a bunch of rotten vittles that 'ud make you faint away,
An' the end is very simple—there's a little splash of spray
An' another stoker's buried in the brine!

It's shovel, shovel, shovel!

An' it's sweat, sweat, sweat!

It ain't no merry picnic

You can make that bet,

But we gotta keep the pressure
While the hot grates roar,

Their everlastin' holler

"Give us more! more! more!"

-Berton Braley.

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