66 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



standard, no cut and dried plan, no official 

 authorative fiat. Eacli person was left en- 

 tirely free to carry out his own idea of 

 making something good and ^eauliful ; to 

 plan and paint his house according to his 

 own will without outside interference. Now 

 every man's work, if he is left free, is but 

 the clothing with material forms of his own 

 mind and inward nature ; and, as no two 

 persons are alike, we find a wide range of 

 styles and contrasts in the houses. This 

 seems to be in harmony with one of Nature's 

 first laws, viz., variety. Now beauty and 

 good taste attract ; ugliness and bad taste 

 repel ; and there is a slow but natural growth 

 upward. The homely is eliminated ; the 

 graceful and beautiful are extended. This is 

 Nature's method of growth. Standard and 

 fixed rules interfere with this and are not 

 good. Grading means uniformity, means 

 sameness. Is sameness desirable ? If so, 

 will grading best secure it ? A grade means 

 standard ; standard means stopping ; stop- 

 ping means death and decay. A good con- 

 clusion to reach is that nothing is so perfect 

 that it cannot be further advanced toward 

 perfection. But is even perfection desirable ? 

 Will we be satisfied or benefited by reaching 

 the end of improvement ? What will happen 

 when there is no goal ahead ? No promised 

 land to strive for ? Admitting grading to be 

 desirable, how shall we best secure it ? Some 

 bee keepers have fine perceptions of order, 

 are neat and tasty in all their work ; their 

 houses are nicely painted, the lawn is smooth 

 and green, trees and flowers adorn it, the 

 bee yard is clean, the hives tastily arranged, 

 and the owner blacks his boots and wears a 

 collar. Other bee keepers will go to break- 

 fast without washing their faces or combing 

 their hair. I have known some of this kind. 

 I have visited a bee keeper whose extracting 

 room was a disgrace to a common cow 

 stable, and I have heard that there were 

 others who actually did not even paint their 

 bee hives. 



After you have established your grades 

 and each of these classes has tried honestly 

 to come up to the "scratch," will their 

 honey be alike in anything but being marked 

 the same grade ? No, it will not be, and the 

 only way you can make it so is by making 

 the hands and minds alike that prepared it. 

 Why not ha\e ijrinting graded ? How would 

 you, Brother Hutchinson, like to be com- 

 pelled to have your work on the Review 

 classed with some printing you know of and 

 be compelled to accept average pay ? 



I prepare my honey by taking all clover 

 and basswood, cleaning the sections in the 

 most careful way, and then never mixing 

 even slightly dark combs with very white 

 ones in the same crate. Each shade of color 

 is kept together and each crate filled entirely 

 with the same shade. A very white crate is 

 all very white. A slightly darker grade is 

 all kept together in the same way. The 

 honey in these different crates is equally 

 good in real eating quality, and will give en- 

 tire satisfaction, but will please far better 

 than to mix them in the same crate. Before 

 nailing up my cases the material is run over 

 a surface planer and made very smooth and 

 clean. They are then nailed in a neat man- 

 ner with small wire finishing nails, and the 

 inside neatly lined with water proof building 

 paper ; and when finished a twenty-section 

 crate weighs only two pounds, a ten- section 

 one but one and one-half pounds. The honey 

 is put in, assorted as before described, the 

 tops nailed on, and then a label, which 

 reads : 



NO. 1 CLOVER HONEY 



FROM THE 



FORESTVILLE APIARY, 



B. T.W'LOlt, Propkietor. 

 Forcjtville, - AVinocsota.. 



Is neatly pasted on the front of each crate 

 immediately above the glass. 



Now I do not ask the aid of any outside 

 grading to help me to sell my goods. I 

 have sold many tons of it in past years 

 without ever hearing a word of complaint. 

 In 188;t I hired a car, loaded it with my own 

 hands, putting paper around and between 

 each tier of crates, accompanied it to a 

 Western city, and, sample crate in hand, 

 sought a buyer. The first one met asked : 



" How much of your honey is like this 

 sample ? " 



"All of it, sir." 



The price was at once agreed upon, the 

 honey delivered, the money paid. 



Without loss or delay the same year 8,000 

 pounds were sent to New York and a good 

 price quickly returned, with the pleasing 

 news, "As fine a lot as we ever handled. 

 Plenty of room for such goods at toj} jjrices." 



Nature offers a banquet free to all, but she 

 seems to give a premium to the quick wit 



