600 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Xlie "Wiley r,ie, about the manu- 

 facture of comb-honey by machinery, 

 seems to almost possess elements of 

 immortality, judging by the various 

 forms in which it revives and re-appears 

 before the reading public. The latest 

 and newest "revised version" of that 

 "old yarn" stflrted yea'rs ago, is con- 

 tained in the following, credited to the 

 Philadelphia Times, and republished in 

 the Clinton, Iowa, Herald, of March 26, 

 1892, and sent to us by Mr. E. J. Gunn, 

 of Wall Lake, Iowa. The item in which 

 is found the " lively ghost" of the Wiley 

 misrepresentation, reads thus : 



Misdirected Entekpkise. — The con- 

 stant improvement of burglars' tools is 

 hardly an uglier adjunct of modern 

 civilization than the rapid progress in 

 the variety and ingenuity of fcod adul- 

 terations. Eggs and apples, almost 

 alone, are still above suspicion. Cloves, 

 tea, ground coffee, vanilla, lemon-juice 

 and mustards are nearly as frequently 

 imitated as dairy butter. Cheese is filled 

 with lard, and lard with corn meal. The 

 abolition of sugar duties has failed to 

 stop the traffic in glucose. Candy fac- 

 tories use "terra alba" by tons. With 

 an admixture of an extract from hickory 

 buds and ginger, common treacle can be 

 made to resemble maple syrup suffi- 

 ciently close to fool nine out of ten non- 

 specialists. 



" Flavoring extracts " are made from 

 such things as wood vinegar and coal 

 tar, but the meanest tricks are those 

 practiced by the venders of honey. A 

 vile compound of glucose and stearic 

 acid is poured into factory-mado combs, 

 and sold in dainty wooden frames, which 

 in one case were found to consist of 

 ligneous pasteboard — a triple combina- 

 tion of frauds paralleled only in a cer- 

 tain sample of "mustard," which an 

 analyst found to be a compound of four 

 different ingredients, two of which had, 

 so to express it, been subadulterated. 



It is astonishing to what a severe 

 racking some scribblers, for the daily 

 newspapers will subject their brains, in 

 order to discover something that will 

 deceive their readers. How difTcrent 

 would be the effect of such items if the 

 general public were well-informed con- 

 cerning the how of honey-production, 

 and could but see the utter impossibility 

 of obtaining honey in the manner pre- 



scribed by such visionary, oyster-brained 

 deceivers as are employed by some news- 

 papers to fill up their space. 



The very best service any of us can 

 do, is to endeavor to counteract the evil 

 effects of these prevarications, by plac- 

 ing before the public as much informa- 

 tion as we can regarding the way honey 

 is produced by the bees, and show that 

 there is no foundation in fact for the 

 many mean misrepresentations scattered 

 broadcast by those who are ignorant and 

 malicious. 



One of the most desirable bills in- 

 troduced into Congress for this season is 

 the postal fractional currency bill. It 

 will, if passed, bring great relief to those 

 who have to send money in the mails. 

 It provides that after the first of next 

 January no more postal notes shall be 

 issued by the post-office department, 

 but in their stead postal fractional cur- 

 rency should be issued in denominations 

 of 5, 10, 25, 50 and 75 cents, and to 

 be legal tender for all sums under one 

 dollar. We hope that it will become a 

 law. The postal notes are no more safe, 

 and give much more trouble at both 

 ends of the route. Let us have the 

 fractional currency, by all means. 



Furniture Polishes. — A red 



polish for furniture is made as follows : 

 16 ounces oil of turpentine ; 4 drams 

 alkanet ; and 4 ounces beeswax. Digest 

 the alkanet in the oil until sufficiently 

 colored ; then scrape the beeswax fine, 

 and form a homogeneous mixture by 

 digesting over a water-bath. For a pale 

 polish, omit the alkanet. For white 

 polish, use 1 pound of whitewax, and 

 32 ounces solution of potash. Boil to 

 proper consistency. 



Knife and Fork handles that 

 may have become loosened, can be 

 cemented again by using a mixture of 

 four parts of rosin, one of beeswax, and 

 one of brick-dust melted together. 



