TRADE TOPICS.

Press, Volume L, Issue 14985, 4 June 1914, Page 11

TRADE TOPICS.

.FROM OT-R OWN' CORRT.SPONDE.VT.) LONDON. April 24. BEES FROM HOLLAND. Ten million Dutch bees have just been landed at London Bridge; they aro the last hope of English beekeepers. Mr 3fason, the well-known bee authority, has decided to introduce Dutch bees into English hives in the hope of checking the ravages of the Isle of Wight disease, which has devastated English hives in many parts of tho country. The Dutch bees are supposed to be immune. The shipment was carried in 300 skeps. 13 boxes, and 6 hives. These were loaded into railway trucks and taken down to Bures, in Suffolk, whero Mr Mason's bee farm is situated.

TRADE IN HUMAN HAIR,

At the moment the demand for European hair - is none too steady, and if a flat styie of hairdressing remains in favour then tho hair trade will experience a slack time. Tho demand for long hair from China and the States is- dead. A few years ago, when the coronet plait and the coiffure of curls were in fashion, there \v,v f a "boom" "in hair. "It is at such times as these," says an authority, "that Oriental hair is most used, when the supply of European hair is not ..ufficient to meet the demand. , Otherwise it is not extensively' stocked by really good firms, because it is neither so fine nor so pleasant to look at as European hair, and it has to bo bleached and treated to obtain light --hades." The best hair comes from Germany, France, Italy, and Austria, nnd a woman who owns a really good head of it can soil it for at least £3.

TAST. OMNIBUS TRAFFIC

The chairm.an of the London General Omnibn. Company says that last year the company s- omnibuses carried 576 million pas-enters—rather less than half the- population of the world. That "meant theyhad carried the whole papulation of London. 100 times in a year. The fares paid amounted to three millions' sterling, and out of that the, company distributed £1,500.000 in wages. Tho staff numbered 18,000 men,-which, with those of allied concerns; • totalled nearly 20,000. In and around London they had 500 miles of track, worked by over 3000 omnibuses and 10,000 driver.- and conductors, and during tho course of the year the omnibuses Tan over 105.000 000 miles. During the recent Easter, holidays in four'davs the omnibuses carried 5_ million poople.

MONEY IN MUSHROOMS

AlthougTi mushrooms have attained the leputation of an uncertain crop, tire Board of Agriculture points out that with proper attention they may be grown either out of doors or inside, with excellent and profitable results, and their-culture could, with advantage,, bo greatly extended. On a commercial scale,- quantities of first-class mushrooms are grown-in old limestone pits, shale mines, quarries, disused railway tunnels, underground cellars, old ice-houses. empty. rhubarb-forcing houses, sheds—in fact, any place which can be kept dark, and where sufficient manure for new beds can bo stored to keep-up a temperature of 60deg. Fah. Cakes of spawn broken up into pieces as iarge as a hen's egg are inserted in the bed some three inches deep in holes. a foot apart, and then firmly covered up. If all goes well, the young mushropms may be expected about sis to eight, weeks' time. The gathering ol' the. crops is an important feature. Mushrooms should never be cut with a knife, but given a sharp trtist and pulled clean out, the lower'part of the stem being cut off afterwards.