1886 



gleaxi:n^gs in bee clj/ii'iie. 



-If) 



have suspected. You know the " nameless ! 

 disease '' is often cured by exchanging" ! 

 queens. \ 



FALSE STATEMENTS IN REGARD TO THE HON- 

 EY BUSINESS OF OUR COUNTRY. 



As a protection to our bee-keeping population, we propose in 

 this department to publish the names of newspapers that per- 

 sist in publishing false statements in regard to the purity of 

 honey which we as bee-keepers put on the market. 



WORSE AND AVORSE; BUT, GREAT IS TRUTH. AND 

 WILL, PRE V All,. 



'E copy the following f ronithe Cliicago 

 Advance of Dec. 31 , ISSo. You will 

 notice that it is not hearsay, but 

 something from the editor's own per- 

 sonal experience. 



Pliny, the historian, laments that in his ilegener- 

 ate times men had learned to imitate realities and 

 practice frauds tipon the people. In proof of this 

 he mentions a case in which Eg'3'ptian priests, who 

 understood the natural sciences better, perhaps, 

 than any others in the world at that time, had palm- 

 ed off on the public counterfeit precious stones. 

 They had learned to color glass, and take stones 

 of varied values and cement them so that the un- 

 trained eye could not disting-uish the combination 

 from real gems. Rut what would Plinj- think if he 

 lived to-day and found what prog-ress had been 

 made in the art of imitationV We have laws 

 against counterfeiting' money, but none against 

 adulterating food. I believe that thousands of peo- 

 ple every year are seriously injured, if not killed, 

 by the use of impure food. 



I have recently had some personal experience in 

 this matter. I tried in vain to g'et pure butter at 

 prominent groceries in this city. It was oleotnar- 

 garine, or something else, every time, 'i'hen 1 sent 

 to the country, and procured some real butter from 

 a family that I knew, but when it came it was artifi- 

 cially colored and wholly unpalatable. At last by 

 writing to the interior of Iowa to a personal ac- 

 (luaintance I succeeded in getting- ]>ure butter. 

 The time was, until recently, that if one got honey 

 in the comb, he was sure about it. But all that is 

 changed. Men have learned not only to manufac- 

 ture the comb much more rapidly and cheaply than 

 the bees can do it, but now All it, capping the so- 

 called honey cells by machinery, and sell it at a low- 

 er figure than any at wnich the real ho!iey can be 

 produced. Some of our readers know unscrui)u- 

 lous men in the country who having bought a few 

 hives of bees, almost immediately began selling 

 great quantities of honey in the comb. They pro- 

 cured it from the manufacturers of the adulterated 

 article, but any one familiar with the taste of the 

 real honey easily detects the fraud. I went to one 

 grocer in this city, who had recently purchased, 

 from Ohio, a thousand pounds of what he honestly 

 supposed real honey, and convinced him in Ave 

 minutes that almost the entire quantity was made 

 up of s.vrups, deftly secured in the comb. He sim- 

 ply said, "What are we coming to':'" We have no 

 State laws sufficiently guarded in their provisions 

 to reach these rascals, and punish them as they de- 

 serve. It may be permissible to manufacture the 

 stuff called oleomargarine, or butterine, but to sell 

 either as butter should l)e made a criminal offense 

 and punished accordingly. 



One of the most unique cases of adulteration that 

 has yet been mentioned is reported from New 

 .Jersey, where a man was arrested a few days ago 

 for selling false eggs. The shell was made of some 

 translucent substance; the white of an albuminous 

 preparation, and the yolk of saffron and carrot. 

 Strangest of all, they made a very good omelet. 

 The fraud was detected only when they were boiled. 

 The ingenious manufacturer exhibited his wares to 

 a New York dealer, and declared that they could 

 be made on a large scale for half a cent apiece, 

 while real eggs cost from three to four cents. I 

 should think these conspirators would be ashamed 

 to look an honest hen in the face. 



You will notice that the editor goes back 

 to Pliny, and laments the degenerate times. 

 He tloes not tell what he has heard, nor 



does he copy from other papers, but he tells 

 his own personal experience. In regard to 

 the butter part of his story, I will leave that 

 to the dairy.people and dairy journals; but, 

 Mr. Editor of ihe^UlvdiK-e, we beg leave to 

 inform you that men have not learned to 

 manufacture comb, and fill it with honey or 

 any substitute. 



If you have a desire to be fair and just (and 

 the editor of a Christian journal certainly 

 should have), we ask youto give us the name 

 and address of the grocer who purchased 

 that thousaiKl i)ounds of honey from Ohio, 

 that we may correct him as well as yourself; 

 and when you give satisfactory proof that 

 that comb honey was manufactured that you 

 saw. we will pay you SlOOO for the informa- 

 tion. In behalf of tiie State of Oiiio I also 

 call upon you to give the name of the man 

 from whoin that honey was puichased. 



■' What are we coming to?'" surely. In re- 

 gard to youi- wind-up on tlie egg business, 

 we beg leave to submit to you the article in 

 our last issue on this matter. Now, if you 

 refuse to notice this, or to do simple justice 

 to a large class of i)eople whom you have in- 

 jured by your statements, we, as a body of 

 ))ee-keepers, refuse to subscribe to your paper; 

 and we call upon Christian peoide in general 

 to aid us in bringing about justice. We are 

 thus vehement in the matter, because, month 

 after month, agricultural and leligious pa- 

 pers persist in publishing such tlaraaging 

 false statements : and not only that, they 

 almost without exception refuse to correct 

 the mischief they have done. The Bural 

 Xctr-Y(>ik( r iim\ Pndrir FaniK r have given 

 us a hearing ; but the rest of the press, at 

 present writing, seem almost wholly given 

 over to persistent falsehood. They remind 

 us of the text, • lie. that being often re- 

 l)roved hardeiieth his neck, shall suddenly be 

 destroyed, and that without remedy.'' and I 

 have not a bit of doubt but that the warning 

 in the text will be ultimately fulfilled. Xo 

 doubt the man who manufactured (V) artifi- 

 cial eggs will be ashamed to look an "honest 

 hen ■' in the face; but, how about the editors 

 who get up these stories? 



Since the above was written, Ernest has 

 returned from New York. Among his wife's 

 relations is an inspector, appointeil by the 

 State of New York, to look up artificial but- 

 ter, or oleomargarine. This State inspector 

 visits the restaurants and groceries in the 

 city of New York. lie does not tell them 

 who he is— goes into a restaurant as anybody 

 does. Whenever '^ oleo " is given him for 

 butter, the proprietor is punished according 

 to law. Well, how much do you suppose he 

 has found that was not butter V compara- 

 tively little— at any rate by no means such a 

 large amount as the newspapers state. Very 

 likely you will say he is bribed ; but, dear 

 friends, we happen to know better. Now, of 

 course, I do not know about butter as I do 

 about lioney and— eggs ; but I will submit 

 to your own good sense, readers of Glean- 

 ings, is it not quite probable that the editor 

 of the Witness tasted some poor butter, and 

 jumped to the conclusion that it was manu- 

 factured y By the way, another fact has 

 come out in regard to artificial lioney. A 

 good majiy have been calling poor dark hon- 



