2l8 



A Modern Bee-Farm 



CHAPTER XXIV. 



HONEY, AND SOME OF ITS USES. 



HONEY is a wonderful gift of nature, and stands almost, 

 alone as a pure natural sweet,. perfect in itself. There 

 are very many who have the impression that bees make honey ;'> 

 but this is far from being the case. Flowers secrete nectar 

 under the- chemical action of the atmosphere upon the juices 

 of the plant, and this process is continued daily until the bee 

 while gathering such production is the means of mixing the 

 pollen of different flowers, almost invariably of the same kind, 

 and thus being fertilised and the plant made capable of repro- 

 duction by seeding, the object of the sweet attraction is 

 accomplished ; the flower fades, and the nectaries are 



dried up. 



The Crude Nectar, 



on being disgorged by the bee from its honey stomach, has 

 then imparted to it its remarkable preservative quality in the 

 shape of a minute proportion of formic acid. Even now it does 

 not" form hqney as we use it. The newly gathered liquid is 

 distributed over as large a comb surface as the number of 

 vacant cells will allow ; and thereafter the heat and ventila- 

 tion afforded by the prosperous condition of the colony at the 

 time, together with the constant circulation of air maintained 

 in a systematic manner by the vibration of their wings kept 



