488 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



with white clover blossoms, only to mock 

 you with their whiteness, without yielding 

 a pound of surplus. Indeed, of late, a good 

 honey year at the North is the exception 

 rather than the rule. 



The loss of a single crop isn't anything 

 like so bad as to have your whole apiary 

 rotten with foul brood. 



Be thankful yoa have your bees left in a 

 healthy condition, and that you are not 

 laid up with a broken leg ; take good care 

 of your pets ; keep a stiff upper lip, and it 

 is possible that even this year, from some 

 unexpected source, the bees may surprise 

 you with a little surplus. 



Here's Oeie on California !— The 



following item of "news" was published 

 recently in the New York Recorder : 



Fooling the Thrifty Bee. — Once in St. 

 Paul a $1.50 a day laborer had lung trouble. 

 He went to Southern California and began 

 keeping bees. Last year he sold .$40,000 

 woEth of honey. Bees do well in Southern 

 California, for flowers bloom in all seasons, 

 and they keep on laying up honey for the 

 winter that never comes. Great joke on 

 the bees, isn't it ? 



This would do as a "great joke" if it 

 weren't such a great lie. The idea of get- 

 ting .$40,000 out of bees in one season — and 

 a " lung troubled" fellow at that! Gra- 

 cious, what could a healthy fellow do ? 

 We'll have to commend this California 

 yarn to Rambler, seeing it is •' rambling " 

 around among the newspapers. But they 

 are two very difl'erent kinds of " ramblers," 

 you know ! 



For a retail market, exellence of 

 honey should be the prime consideration, 

 but the attractiveness of the package should 

 never be lost sight of. — Newman. 



Hetldon'si Reply to Oaarges. — 



Last week we promised to give in this num- 

 ber a reply from Mr. Heddon to Bro. Root's 

 charges of adulteration, which reply was 

 printed in Gleauiiujs for April 1st. Here 

 it is: 



Bear Mr. Root : — As a brother bee-keeper, 

 brother-publisher, and brother-man, stand- 

 ing under the law which certainly should 

 not be more charitable than social and com- 

 mercial judgment, and being always inno- 

 cent until proven guilty, I crave space at 

 your hand to make some statements and 

 arguments in reference to the damaging 

 matter which has appeared from time to 



time in your journal, culminating in very 

 serious charges implied, although not posi- 

 tively preferred, against me in your last 

 issue. 



* * * * You state that "com- 

 plaints kept coming." I cannot imagine 

 whom they came from, when nineteen- 

 twentieths of my customers praised the 

 honey I shipped them, to the highest stan- 

 dard. I here and now call upon every per- 

 son who has purchased honey of me during 

 the last two years in question, or at any 

 other time, for that matter, to send to this 

 journal {(rleiininys) for publication, a state- 

 ment of their opinion as to its purity and 

 quality, and why that opinion, and what 

 satisfaction said honey gave to their custo- 

 mers, to the best of their knowledge. I 

 send you a list of my bee-keeper customers 

 for 1893 and 1894, which includes nearly 

 every one of them. You will understand 

 that most of my 1893 crop was also sold to 

 the persons named in the list for 1893. 



But in the list of 1893 are two names I 

 wish to specially refer to. One is F. Min- 

 nich, of North Freedom, Wis. He said my 

 honey was not as good as his own, and 

 didn't give good satisfaction, and then 

 added the following: "You got a terrible 

 blowing up at our State convention, in re- 

 gard to sugar-honey, which served you just 

 right." Here it will be seen that 1 lost a 

 customer who discovered inferior quality 

 in my honey because of what Prof. Cook 

 said and wrote, and what Mr. Minnich had 

 been informed, by "reports coming in," 

 was said by me. 



The other one is Geo. G. Willard, who 

 was arrested, as you state. 



Under date of June 2. 1893, Mr. Willard 

 wrote me as follows, in response to my 

 solicitation for his testimonial: " Some of 

 your honey has given satisfaction, some 

 not. I have had better. Some of the late 

 made honey was strong and poor." Mr. 

 Willard had been one of my best customers, 

 and I was surprised at his response to my 

 solicitation for his testimony. However, 

 on the 5th of the following August he or- 

 dered three GO-pound cans, and on the '24th 

 of the same month, five more 60-pound 

 cans; then on the 15th of the following 

 November. 10 cans more, every drop of 

 which was strictly pure, and 13 cans of 

 which have been returned and re-remitted 

 for. less the freight. These 13 cans are now 

 in my honey-house, just as they arrived 

 from Mr. Willard, and the honey is candied 

 solid. This is all I knojv about the Willard 

 honey. 



Now, who is the well-known bee-keeper 

 who purchased two cans of honey, and sent 

 the affidavit ? When at the World's Fair 

 last fall I called on Thomas G. Newman, 

 Manager of the Bee-Keepers' Union. While 

 there he showed me two bottles of honey 

 said to be adulterated, and taken from one 

 of my cans. Now, I do not pretend to be 

 able to detect glucose in honey, by any 

 method whatever; but the sample shown 

 by Mr. Newman gave me the impression of 

 being pure basswood honey that had been 

 taken from the hives before it should have 

 been, and very "green,"' or else had been 



