Sept. 6, 1906 



765 



American Hee Journal 



from it. They are good men, strong men, and a neces- 

 sary part of our Association. I am only calling attention 

 to the fact that in some points our business interests clash. 

 I would have you guard your interests as shrewdly as they 

 guard theirs. They themselves, I am convinced, would not 

 have you do otherwise, for they are upright men and at 

 heart desire your prosperity. You do not always study your 

 own interests as you ought. They, in a fatherly fashion, at- 

 tempt to guide you, and you are too much inclined to follow 

 blindly. But no man can serve two masters. It is not in 

 human nature that they should adequately care both for your 

 interests and their own when those interests clash. It is a 

 sound principle of law that no man may be judge in his own 

 matter. Burns sounds the same note : 



I'll na say men are villains a', 

 But och ! Mankind are unco weak. 



An' little to be trusted; 

 If self the wav-ring balance shake, 



It's rarely right adjusted! 



You ask for concrete examples. Well, take this : Soon 

 after the white clover season was over some of our leading 

 journals came out with the usual advice to sell your honey 

 early; that the early sellers got the best prices; and, forth- 

 with, bee-keepers, where they had any crop, were tumbling 

 over each other to get rid of their honey at any price. 



The advice was bad for your interests in a year of 

 scarcity, but disastrous in a year of plenty, for nothing is so 

 ruinous as a glut in the market, unless it be the concomitant, 

 to-wit : the piling up of honey in cold, damp warehouses to 

 sweat and crack and become ruined. I don't question the 

 honesty of the advice, but given, I doubt not, on account of a 

 vision clouded by some conflicting interest. Dealing in honey 

 may have been involved, or the desire to stir up the tyro 

 to get rid of his honey lest he in his inexperience should 



R. I. TAYLOR. 



neglect too long and so give up the business in disgust; 

 for know that it is common to all the allied interests to aim 

 to secure and maintain an ever-increasing constituency of 

 bee-keepers. That this should be accomplished is obviously 

 contrary to the interests of existing bee-keepers. We have 

 room for all earnest, intelligent and stable students of api- 

 culture, who turn in with us because they are birds of a 

 feather. But the majority are not such. They come in 

 thinking to make an easy fortune. They endure but for a 

 time, play havoc with our markets, and then fall out by the 

 way. 



Perhaps there are no conditions in which the honey- 

 producer must be more careful to use all his intelligence and 

 caution than in dealing with jobbers and commission men. 



It you entrust them with honey, the grading is not, right, or the 

 tare is too little, or your weight of the honey is too much 

 on account of which, or by some carelessness or negligence 

 on their part, the true weight of your honey is not ac- 

 counted for. 



If you express any hesitation about intrusting them with 

 with your goods — you have little faith in mankind; if you 

 suggest some condition to test their faith in mankind, that is 

 contrary to business principles. 



In 25 years' experience I do not remember that I had one 

 fully square deal at their hands, unless I either required pre- 

 payment or delivered the goods in person, until this year; 

 and yet I believe they were honest men — self the wavering 

 balance shook. This year I found the exception that proved 

 the rule. Rather against my judgment, I made a consider- 

 able shipment because I lacked time to dispose of it as I have 

 heretofore found most satisfactory. In due time, the report 

 came that the honey arrived in fine condition, that the pack- 

 ing and grading were above criticism, with a check for a 

 larger sum than my bill called for. Perhaps I ought to give 

 the name, but he is present and such men are modest. 



Another point! Some of you no doubt have already 

 learned that in the matter of supplies your interests and 

 the interests of the dealer are antagonistic. Some say the 

 dealers in supplies have formed a trust to control prices, 

 or at least have an understanding, that amounts to the same 

 thing. But I am bound to say that as yet I am not ready 

 to go so far, for to form a combine is unlawful, and there- 

 fore dishonorable, and I take them to be honorable men. 

 And as yet, it is not to be denied that there are many 

 things that seem to point to a combination. Once one could 

 easily get a reduction from published prices, but now if he 

 suggests it he hardly gets a civil answer. Then there is a 

 constant tendency to crowd prices up unnecessarily. In the 

 case of sections this is perhaps most noticeable. Not many 

 weeks ago a manufacturer of supplies dilated in one of our 

 journals on the outlook for sections. Timber was getting 

 scarce and more costly, so that the price of sections must 

 go up. Indeed, the prospect was that basswood and one- 

 piece sections must go out, then four-piece sections must 

 come in at another advance of 75 cents a thousand; and a 

 sub-editor and a bee-keeper responds in substance, Let them 

 go up ; we can stand it. 



But we can't stand it if they are not worth it, i. e., if the 

 profits are too high. I have what is to me satisfactory proof. 

 Within the last 18 months I have bought just 25 M. 

 sections, partly one-piece but mostly four-piece. The dealer 

 said he could let me have the one-piece at $2.70, but the 

 four-piece did not cost so much to make and he could sell 

 them at $2.50 a M., and those were the highest prices I paid. 

 And this was not a sacrifice sale. The sections were not only 

 all No. 1, but they were made to order. 



One reason of the high prices is the branch houses, and 

 the immense amount of advertising done by dealers. You 

 pay for these luxuries without receiving any equivalent for 

 your money. 



Another curious argument is used to boom the price of 

 sections. The honey-producer can afford to pay the prices 

 because he gets a higher price still for them when he sells 

 them with the honey. How millennium-like this would 

 sound: Section comb foundation 15 cents a pound only, 

 because the bee-keeper cannot get more than that when 

 he sells it with the honey. 



To illustrate how carefully the supply dealers belonging 

 to the allied interests look after their own profits when the 

 interests of the honey-producer intervenes, let me give one or 

 two more items. Information comes to me from a manu- 

 facturer of a certain line of supplies that he was aranging 

 to give members of this Association a large reduction in 

 the price of his line of goods. When news of this move- 

 ment got abroad, he was communicated with by a repre- 

 sentative of a company prominent as supply dealers and 

 members of the Honey-Producers' League, with the result 

 that he was compelled to withdraw from the arrangement; 

 the immediate consequence of which withdrawal was that 

 for the time being at least you were compelled to pay for a 

 line of goods much used by honey-producers, a price almost 

 ;o percent higher. 



Again, I am credibly informed that glass for shipping- 

 cases could have been bought recently at the factory in small 

 lots at $1.50 a box, but an extensive dealer also connected 



