_We_—that is we greenies—use the Isham honey box—the nicest, staunchest, and handiest honey box _we_ ever saw. We know him he lives round here, he _has_ a patent on his box—we saw his papers, all reg’lar—he deserves them too—has lately sold three counties to an apiarian who has seen a good many such affairs, and sold for a handsome sum. If you saw it, you would want a State at least—the _work_ would suit your taste.
Now to finish all this rigmarole and to convince you that we are your friend, tho’ we expect you will blow us with a stiff breeze, we say—we frankly confess, that we have tried your tin corners for frames, after using wooden ones, and we don’t want to see in our hives another frame that has not those same tin corners. And our _green_ advice to all beginners is, don’t make a single frame till you get these corners. We shall get rid of all our frames which have not these corners just as fast as we can. We have tried several hundred of them and now we send our orders for 6500 more _with the cash_, as evidence that we mean what we say.
[We can give full address to any who may desire, but the writer at present prefers a nom de plume.—Ed.]
At the risk of having the above sound something like a puff for the corners, we have decided to give it a place, especially as some disparaging remarks that have been given might tend towards giving an impression that the corners hardly deserve. We will cheerfully give place to anything on the contrary side, coming from any Apiary where they have been considerably used.
Our friends are in error about Mrs. Tupper using a frame 12×12 _inside_. Variety of taste has dictated so many different thicknesses of the stuff composing the frames, that we cannot see how our friend gets rid of fractions by using _inside_ dimensions as a standard. We have seen end bars in use _one inch_ in thickness and top bars with a massive comb guide still thicker. Supposing we all should adopt a uniform size inside of frame, where would be the outside, and what would be dimensions of hive to suit? We can readily make metal cornered frames to agree in outside dimensions, with any frame in use, and this allows them to be worked in the same hive mixed up with the old ones, thus giving the owner a fair chance to contrast their lightness, ease in handling, and at the same time greater capacity for brood and honey, from the larger comb surface.