676 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



and I recommend that steps be taken in this convention to draft and 

 secure the passage of such bills as we may agree upon. Concerning 

 the adulteration of honey I have to cite such an example as the fol- 

 lowing: Shortly before our organization last spring I purchased 

 so-called liquid honey at twenty-five cents per pint, which I knew 

 was mostly glucose, because it had neither the flavor nor sweetness 

 of honey. It was, of course, extracted and adulterated afterwards 



A few days ago I went into the same store and examined the same 

 preparation and found over the original label a more recent one had 

 been pasted, upon which was printed "Honey Mixture: one part 

 honey, two parts glucose." This jar sold for only fifteen cents, 

 although it was exactly the same in every particular as that for 

 which I had formerly paid twenty-five. This means that the value 

 of pure honey is to be maintained by exposing frauds and adulter- 

 ations and enforcing the law and compelling these cheap substances 

 to be sold for what they are, rather than in competition with the 

 genuine article. 



In Pennsylvania there are about twenty-eight thousand bee- 

 keepers, who produced last year about two million five hundred thou- 

 sand pounds of honey, and which would load a freight train one mile 

 in length. Our State has not usually been regarded as a great honey- 

 producing state because this subject has not been properly brought 

 before the public. Today the field is open, the ground is fallow and 

 the soil is fertile; it remains for us to plant and cultivate the seed 

 which will result in good fruit for ourselves and future honey-pro- 

 ducers. Let us be encouraged by what has already been accom- 

 plished in less than a year, and push forward with the expectation of 

 increasing our membership, and securing the other aims of our or- 

 ganization. In Union there is strength. 



Before us is a crusade of education which demands the energy and 

 attention of every intelligent person interested in bee-keeping or 

 honey production. This is to be fourfold, as follows: 



I. The Education of the Public. — (1) The public should be educated 

 to know the true value of pure honey and its medical, health-giving 

 and health-preserving qualities. Since it is a food-stuff already pre- 

 digested, being an inverted sugar, and prepared by the bees ready for 

 digestion to be completed in the human stomach, it can in many 

 instances be eaten by invalids when other sweets can not be taken. 

 Honey is to be found upon my own table every day, and if I were to 

 speak from personal experience I should say that I am sure our 

 appetites are keener, our food more highly relished, our health mucJi 

 better, and our bills, especially for butter and meat, considerably 

 reduced by virtue of the use of this important product of the bees. 

 (2.) We must educate the public in the evils of using adulterated 

 honey, which although it may contain such an apparently harmless 

 adulterant as glucose, has not the sustaining qualities of honey. 

 (3.) We must impress upon our friends the fact that comb honey can 

 not be made artificially and can not be adulterated, and consequently 

 in buying capped or sealed honey they are buying that which has 

 been prepared only by the instrumentality of ''The Little Busy Bee.'' 

 (4.) We must also educate the public to understand that honey in 

 the store-room may be granulated, although pure, and in fact gran- 

 lation or sugaring, especially in cool weather, is an evidence of 



