October, 1914, 



American Hee Jonrnal 



Mr. E. Bertrand 



ence has shown that it will be necessary to 

 start with a bale of the dry sweet clover, 

 and one would probably have to exiractas 

 much as 300 or 400 pounds of the "clover 

 hay.' With this amount of material it could 

 be extracted with ether or some similar sol- 

 vent, and then by well-known methods of 

 analysis the coumarin could be separated in 

 pure form, and the identity of the bitter 

 substance miiiht also at the same time be 

 determined. There is absolutely no use in 

 attemptins; to solve this problem with a 

 small quantity of drug 



f^ARKE, Davis & Company. 



J. M. Francis. 



Shipping Comb Honey by Ex- 

 press 



BY C. T. OHLINGER. 



AFTER several years of experiment- 

 ing with different kinds of pack- 

 ages, such as glass shipping cases, 

 corrugated paper boxes, tin boxes, as 

 containers for comb honey to go by 

 express, I learned that a little decep- 

 tion will insure safe arrival of the 

 fragile article'. Since the days of the 

 parcel post, the rush of business of our 

 (/toi- express companies is over. Yet 

 one is not sure of what will become of 

 a package of comb honey entrusted to 

 the tender mercies of the notorious 

 rough handlers in the employ of the 

 express companies. 



It is a well-known fact that no at- 

 tention is paid to such notices as 

 " Comb Honey," " Handle with Care," 

 "Fragile," "This Side Up," etc. The 

 side that is to go up is sure to go down. 

 When goods arrive in bad order you 

 may put in a claim for damages and 

 wait until the claim is adjusted. There 

 is one package, however, which con- 

 jures up thoughts of careful handling 

 in the minds of express and baggage 

 men, /. e., an e/^^' crate. I have been 

 using them several seasons for ship- 

 ping comb honey by express to custo- 



mers who want from 25 to 50 sections 

 at a time. 



I pack 48 4<5 sections in a crate, 24 

 oil each side of the partition. There 

 will be two rows of 8 sections on the 

 bottom — the sections standing length- 

 wise with the crate — and one row of 

 8 on top next to the partition board. 

 This brings the weight to the center of 

 the crate. The weight of the whole 

 crate will be about the same as that of 

 a full crate of eggs. The empty space 

 is filled out with newspapers to pre- 

 vent the sections from shifting. I pur- 

 posely omit the marks " Comb Honey " 

 on the box. The agent is told that I 

 am shipping comb honey in order to 

 get the proper receipt. But the men 

 who handle the crate in transit get the 

 idea that they are handling eggs, and 

 everything goes well. Sometimes I fill 

 an order for eggs and comb honey. 

 Both go into the same bo.x as a mixed 

 shipment. The egg crate has solved 

 the problem of getting small shipments 

 of comb honey to private parties 

 safely and quickly. 



Angelica, N. Y. 



Honey and Biology 



BY 1. A. HEBERLE, B. S. 



(Bascil on a lecture of Dr. Thocni. fubhsliid in 

 the Sstr/nv. Bienenzeitunj;) 



(continued from page 315.) 



IT was Prof. Langer, of Graz, who 

 first proved that the diastase fer- 

 ment in honey, which w' know 

 changes starch into dextrin is secreted 

 by the honey bee. This has been 

 pr ven by the serological method of 

 diffi^rentiating albumen, of which more 

 will be said. 



Auzinger was the first to experiment 

 with solutions of honey to d'-termine 

 the power of the f.erments. Hi' used 



th ; same method that Koning used to 

 determine the diastase in milk. The 

 method is as follows: Take 10 c. c. of 

 honey solution 1 :2, add 1 c. c. of a solu- 

 tion of starch, strength 1 percent, leave 

 one hour in the water bath at a tem- 

 perature of 45 degrees C. If the honey 

 solution contains diastase, all the 

 stirchwill be changed to sugar. To 

 test this add 1 c. c. of a solution of 

 potassium iodide, shake well and notice 

 the color. If all the starch has been 

 changed, the color will be but little 

 darker than t 'e solution taken for the 

 experiment; if no starch has been 

 changed, the color will be a deep black 

 blue. 



The results obtained with this method 

 tested by various institutions, may b; 

 summarized as follows: Most of the 

 samples of genuine extracted honey, 

 when used in quantities mentioned, 

 gave colors from a bright olive green 

 to a light brown. 



Boiled honey solutions showed a 

 deep blue to a black-blue col r because 

 they contained no active ferments. 

 Heated honeys show the following col- 

 ors according to the elevation of the 

 temp rature and the time of ex|iosure : 

 Red-br .wn, brown-olive, bright blue- 

 green, blue-green, deep blue. Artificial 

 honeys show uniformly a deep black- 

 blue because they contain no ferments. 

 According to the experiments of Leu- 

 enberger, on the influence of heat on 

 honey, in regard to the diastase reac- 

 tion, only temperatures above 90 de- 

 grees C. caused a darkercolorthan that 

 of the same honey not heated. Besides 

 the ferments, there is a specific albu- 

 men present in honey. Its presence is 

 also proven by a biological method. 



the QUANTITATIVE PRECIPITATE REACTION. 



Prof. Langer has also laid the foun- 

 dation to this method. It has been said 

 that the ferments are bound to the 

 albumen molecules, which really means 

 they are a part of the albumen. To 

 obtain the ferments from any solution, 

 re [gents that precipitat albu . en, as 

 alcohol, ammonium sulphate, etc., are 

 used. Such a precipitate contains, be- 

 sides the ferments, all the albuminous 

 bodies. He found thai the albumen in 

 the honey is of animal origin — that it 

 is from the bee. To prove this he used 

 the serological method called the "pre- 

 cipitate reaction." Since this is one of 

 the most important biological meth- 

 ods, a short explanation might interest 

 the readers. 



If a solution from the albumen of a 

 hen's e g be injected a few times in a 

 rabbit, there will be formed, in the 

 blood of this rabbit, a substance called 

 the " precipitate." If blood from this 

 rabbit is taken, and the red corpuscles 

 separated, an almost clear solution^ 

 the serum — is obtained. This serum, 

 through the injection, has acquired the 

 singular property of giving a precipi- 

 tate with a solut on of albumen from a 

 hen's e.tg, but not with any other albu- 

 me I, not even with the albumen from a 

 duck or goose egg. A precipitate with 

 the serum is only obtained w en the 

 albuminous solution is from the same 

 source as the solution used for the in- 

 jection. With this method it is easy to 

 recognize human blood from that of 

 animals, or blood of the ox from that 

 of the horse, etc. 



