Publisht Weekly at IIS Michigan St. 



Geouob W. York, Editor. 



$1.00 a Year — Sample Copy Free. 



38th Year. 



CHICAGO, ILL., JUNE 23, 1898. 



No. 25. 



FACING COMB HONEY. 



Opinions, Suggestions and Advice from the 

 Commission-Men. 



[Continued Irom page 373.1 

 [We have received the following responses to our letter 

 on page 371, since our last week's issue. — Editob.] 



George W. York & Co. — 



Dear Sirs : — We are in receipt of your favor requesting 

 us to give our opinion In regard to the question of facing 

 comb honey, lately discust in the American Bee Journal. As 

 the paragraph referred to is certainly one of great importance 

 to the bee-keepers in general, we cheerfully comply with your 

 request. 



As to the facing of honey, Mr. Doolittle says that he sold 

 his crop of comb honey one year to a New York party and the 

 buyer Instructed to have the honey faced. This was a long 



the producer thought it would be to his Interest. Whether a 

 bee-keeper sells his honey outright or sends it on commission, 

 he naturally expects to realize the highest market value in 

 either case. The quality or the grade of the honey consti- 

 tutes its value. White honey is of a higher merchantable 

 value than the dark, becai;se it can be sold all over, while the 

 dark honey is objected to by a majority of the people on ac- 

 count of its color and its strong and pungent flavor. 



Again, of the white honey, the whitest commands a better 

 price than the travel-stained and yellowed combs, because it Is 

 of nicer appearance to the eye. These facts are generally 



Apiary Building at the Trans-Mississippi Exposition. — {See page 392.) 



time since — perhaps 20 years ago — and the consumers at that 

 time were not so much acquainted with comb honey as they 

 are to-day. It was more of a novelty those days. The party 

 who bought Mr. Doolittle's honey that year evidently had it 

 faced to sell it for a better grade than it really was, perhaps 

 for fancy white, or whatever the facers indicated. We dare 

 say this party did not give orders to have the honey faced or 

 mixt a second year. Abraham Lincoln is quoted as saying : 

 " You can fool some of the people all the time ; you can fool 

 all the people some of the time ; but you can't fool all the people 

 all the time." If Mr. Doolittle's buyer succeeded in disposing of 

 the honey to advantage, and succeeded a second year, his cus- 

 tomers must have been among the some people that you can 

 fool all the time. 



Mr. Doolittle claims that there is nothing out of the way 

 in facing honey if shipt on commission, every crate alike, if 



Sweet Clover. — (See page 



known among the bee-keepers at large, and because they are 

 facts, the grading and the rules of grading comb honey have 

 been materially improved of late years, so the producers miglit 

 be enabled to obtain the highest market value. 



How then can It be to the Interest of any bee-keeper to 



