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THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Aug. 5, 



Honey as a Medicine and Food. 



BY DK. .1. M. HICKS. 



It has again fallen to my lot to tell what I know about 

 the true value of honoy as a medicine and food; also its many 

 uses in the household. It is long since it occurred to me that if 

 we only understood more perfectly the real value of this — one 

 of Nature's most wonderful and best remedies known — in the 

 many ills of both man and beast, it would be more highly ap- 

 preciated and used by the present generation. It was of much 

 value and used by our forefathers and foremothers as a 

 remedy in making plasters for dressing boils and carbuncles 

 in their incipient stage ; it has a wonderful effect in "bring- 

 ing them to a head," and preparing the way for a cure. It 

 was also well known by many of the ancients as a medicine 

 for colic, if administered in medicinal quantities at a proper 

 time ; while it is also well known that, to some, it will pro- 

 duce colic if taken in too large a quanity, and in others it acts 

 as a splendid carthartic anddiuretic, giving tone and strength, 

 as well as purifying the blood. But let me say it should be 

 given in homeoiopathic doses. 



What I have said of honey as a medicine is applicable to 

 pure extracted honey free of the combs or wax — not 

 "strained" honey, but a pure article of extracted honey, 

 which, of course, must vary in its medicinal effects as it does 

 in its quality, owing to and depending upon the flora from 

 which it has been gathered by the bees. 



My space and time at present will not allow me to enu- 

 merate the various flowering plants which produce the best 

 honey as a medicine, but suffice it to say there is a great dif- 

 ference in the medical properties of honey, and it should be 

 carefully selected as well as fully understood by those who 

 prescribe or use it in their aillictions. I will only mention a 

 few of the many troubles that the human family is heir to, for 

 which houey is a sovereign balm. 



First on the list is a severe cold, which is too often the 

 attliction of our children, and many older persons are fre- 

 quently troubled with colds as well. 



It is also a grand remedy in granulated sore eyes — noth- 

 ing better in the whole range of the materia-medica, and for 

 quinsy it has few if any equals if made into a proper gargle 

 and used as it should be. 



Chronic or old sores are greatly benefited if honey and rye- 

 flour is prepared and put on as a dressing or plaster. It would 

 be well for those who may have occasion to test its good 

 qualities to do so, and, my word for it, you will not regret 

 having done so. 



I am quite sure, when I tell you, that honey as a sweet or 

 food, has no superior. If an equal, in the civilized world, and 

 as such it has more true admirers than any other saccharine 

 matter. It is used by all who can afford it in preference for 

 sweetening fruits when cookt for table use. It is a well- 

 known fact that honey is by far preferable in sweetening pies. 

 When made of fruits or rhubarb they have a better flavor 

 than sugar imparts to them. 



Honey Is useful in sweetening cookies. Many kinds are 

 made for family use with honey, well suited to the taste of 

 an epicure. 



I have known and seen some of the most beautiful and 

 best of vinegar made from honey, which if made as it should 

 be will by far excel the so-called cider and acid vinegars of 

 the present day. 



Let me assure you that I have no sinister or personal 

 motive in extolling the good qualities of honey, either medici- 

 nally or for domestic uses, for surely I have none to sell or to 

 offer to the markets, but I have to purchase all I use in pre- 

 paring cough and other syrups. Hut I must say, it too 

 frequently happens that I find loo much syrup of sugar raixt 

 in some of the extracted honey oflered In our markets. I 

 trust the members of this society will try in some way to have 



our State legislature pass such laws that will ultimately put a 

 stop to the nefarious habit of adulteration of any and all 

 foods, and honey to be especially included, under a penalty of 

 a heavy fine and imprisonment. I would also recommend 

 confiscation of the same, when so placed on the market or 

 oflered for sale. — Read at the Indiana Bee-Keepers' Conven- 

 tion. 



Bees Hanging Out — New Drawn Foundation. 



BY ERNEST K. ROOT. 



I had a vague idea that, if we were to make sure that the 

 bees were never crowded for room, in the first place, and the 

 hives were properly shaded, with good-sized entrances, there 

 would not be any of this hanging-out ; and the result of care- 

 ful experiment and observation this season seems to show that 

 this is true. At our out-yard there has been no hanging-out, 

 but quite a little of it at the home yard. The work In the 

 home apiary at the beginning of the flow got behind. At the 

 out-apiary I made sure to keep pace with the bees. As there 

 would be no one present to look after swarms, it was decidedly 

 necessary that the bees should not get into the habll of loafing. 

 There was no loafing here, and only one swarm, that came out 

 several times while I was away. 



As every one knows, banging out and sulking at the front 

 of the hives shows that something is not quite right. A colony 

 in the height of the honey-flow should have no loafing or sulk- 

 ing bees. I told the boys I did not want to have one hive with 

 its bees hanging out in front, even at night. They did not be- 

 lieve that the poor bees could ?iefp coming out when the nights 

 were so hot; but I noticed that stronger colonies in the same 

 apiary were busy at work in the sections, without a loafing 

 bee in front. I said to myself, "We must make these other 

 chaps (the loafers) get down to business like the others." 



As I found years before, so this year, smoking them in did 

 no good. They would come out again just as soon as they got 

 through " rubbing their eyes." Giving them frames of foun- 

 dation and plenty of room sometimes answered, but generally 

 they would cluster out even then. Furnishing the bees a 

 good deal of shade helpt somewhat. Giving them very wide, 

 deep entrances sometimes caused them to go into the hives 

 and go to work. 



This hanging out is indicative of swarming. Early in the 

 season, perhaps the bees area little crampt for room, and they 

 get into the " habit" of loafing; and this habit, once'estab- 

 lisht, is hard to break up ; or perhaps the entrance is too 

 small, or the hive not properly shaded. Any one of these 

 conditions may start the habit, and the only way to break it 

 up is to make the bees tliink they have actually swarmed. I 

 am satisfied that, while the bees are loafing and hanging out 

 at the entrance, they are waiting either for the queen or some 

 of their number to start a swarm forth. 



There were several of our colonies at tha home yard that 

 seemed to be very stubborn. Twoof them would hang out in 

 spite of the fact that I personally alternated every one of their 

 frames of brood and honey with frames of foundation. The 

 habit had been establisht, and, no matter what I did, they 

 would hang out. Finally, the thought occurred to me to take 

 the hive away entirely (a big two-story chaff one) and put in 

 its place an entirely different hive — a single-walled Dovetailed 

 made up of three stories. This was done, and the frames put 

 into the new hive. The greater portion of the bees were 

 shaken out in front, and were made to crawl in at the en- 

 trance. The bees went to work, and there was no loafing 

 from that time on. Another hive was treated In a like man- 

 ner with the same result. 



I am fast coming to believe that. In a well-regulated api- 

 ary, there should not bo a hive with bees hanging out in front. 

 Just think of the waste of over half a colony loafing and doing 



