118 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



scarcity above a certain point. Let that 

 price once be lowered to that of glucose and 

 it will not be an easy matter to raise it 

 again as high as it once was. 



But we are told that bee-keepers are op- 

 posed to the adulteration of honey almost 

 wholly on selfish grounds. This may or may 

 not be true, but I know of at least one bee- 

 keeper who has been quite prominent of late 

 in opposing this business, that has made 

 himself eciually notorious in this community 

 as a grocer who would not sell tobacco, glu- 

 cose-sugars and syrups, adulterated baking 

 powders, etc., and I have no reason to believe 

 that he is more conscientious in this respect 

 than numerous others of the craft that I 

 could mention. Be that as it may, bee-keep- 

 ers would be more than human, if they did 

 not oppose a trafHc, which threatens to ruin 

 the occupation they depend upon for a liv- 

 ing. Right here may I be permitted to ask, 

 what better reason any bee journal can give 

 for its existence than that it is published to 

 promote the interests — the selfish interests 

 if you please of bee-keepers? 



Let it be understood hereafter, that we do 

 not ask that the sale of these goods be pro- 

 hibited, so that you and others who prefer 

 them to l)uckwheat and certain other kinds 

 of honey, can't buy them; hut that when 

 offered for sale, that the packages shall tie 

 labeled, just as butterine is stamped, to in- 

 dicate the character of the goods. Good 

 dairy butter has been selling at retail in 

 Detroit, at from 2r>c. to 30c., per pound, and 

 often hard to get at that. Does any one be- 

 lieve that this would have been the case, if, 

 when the markets were flooded with butter- 

 ine, farmers had concluded to just keep quiet 

 and bend every energy to raising butter so 

 cheaply that no one could afford to produce 

 butterine? You ask us to believe that nearly 

 all the loss that bee-keepers have suffered in 

 consequence of the adulteration of honey, 

 they have themselves to blame for, because 

 they would talk when they should have kept 

 quiet. Now is it reasonable to suppose, that 

 a market can be flooded with such goods 

 year after year, without consumers finding 

 it out, and talking freely about it too? I do 

 not remember that I ever heard a bee-keeper 

 discuss this matter before those not posted, 

 without pointing out the means whereby the 

 purchaser can commonly distinguish between 

 the pure and the impure article. The resolu- 

 tions passed by our late State convention, 

 that have been referred to in this connection 



in rather disparaging terms, were carefully 

 worded with this end in view; and it is not 

 very complimentary to the intelligence of 

 city people, to assert that either they cannot 

 or will not make this distinction, when the 

 characteristics of each are so clearly pointed 

 out; neither has this assertion but little 

 foundation in fact. Previous to the meeting 

 of the Detroit convention, I had one sample 

 of what proved to be adulterated honey, 

 tested l)y Health Officer Duffield, and the ap- 

 pearance of the package was so accurately 

 described in one of the daily papers, as to 

 result in entirely stopping the sale of these 

 goods to retailers, to whom up to this time, 

 a large quantity had been sold; but who soon 

 found their customers would not buy such 

 goods. My own honey, a sample of which 

 had been tested at the same time as the 

 other, and iiublished as pure, in the article 

 alluded to above, now found a ready sale. 

 Quite a number of grocers who had pre- 

 viously refused to buy, as they said they had 

 plenty of honey (referring to the stuff I had 

 analyzed and descriljed) now bought mine 

 in quantities and sold it too; while the fac- 

 tory goods were either returned to the whole- 

 sale, or for the most part yet remain on their 

 shelves. No doubt the label I used helped to 

 secure this result. It read in part. "If your 

 chemist finds these goods adulterated, pub- 

 lish B. Walker, Capac, Mich., (who puts 

 them up,) as a swindler, in your daily paper." 

 Now friend H, if your view of this matter is 

 a correct one, how will you explain the fact, 

 that my sales of extracted honey in Detroit 

 this season — mostly taking place soon after 

 this publication occurred, have been nearly 

 five times as great as any previous season 

 for ten years although my comb honey sales 

 were only about equal to those of last sea- 

 son. Bear in mind, that it was mostly fall 

 honey, such as you would doul)tless pro- 

 nounce inferior in flavor to the adulterated 

 product, and that it brought several times 

 as much per pound as the glucose mixture 

 could l)e sold at profitably at the time. So 

 much for "everlasting clack." 



Again we are told "that very little honey 

 is adulterated now, since producers are 

 putting their honey on the market in smaller 

 packages." Are you quite sure that you are 

 correct in this statement? I can hardly be- 

 lieve you have reached this conclusion 

 through personal observation. At any rate, 

 I have reached just the opposite conclusion 

 through a somewhat extended use of that 



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