CHAPTER XX. 



Honey Handling. 

 Marketing Honey. 



835. The quality of honey depends very little, if at all, 

 upon the secretions of the bees; and hence, apple blossom, 

 white clover, buckwheat, and other varieties of honey, havs 

 each their peculiar flavor, and color. The difference between 

 the honey of one blossom, and that of another, is so great, 

 that persons unacquainted with this diversity, when tasting 

 honey different from that to which they are accustomed, 

 imagine that either the one or the other is adulterated. 



The most-prized and best-flavored honey produced in this 

 country, is that from white clover blossoms (YOl). Bass- 

 wood honey, if unmixed with any other grade, is too strong 

 in taste, but a slight quantity of it in clover honey makes a 

 delicious dish. Both these grades, being very white, sell more 

 readily than any other, in the comb, excepting perhaps al- 

 falfa honey and the white honey of the California sage.* 



Smart-weed, or heartsease, honey,— which should properly 

 be called knot-weed or Persicaria honey,— is of a pale yel- 

 low color and veiy fine in flavor. Asters produce honey 

 nearly as white as clover. Different grades of fall-honey, 

 from Spanish needles, golden-rod, iron-weed, etc., are of a 

 yellow color, and strong in taste. Buckwheat honey is dark; 

 boneset honey and honey dew are the ugliest and poorest 

 in quality, looking almost like molasses. 



• The honey of Hymettus, which has been so celebrated from the most 

 ancient times, is of a fair golden color. The lightest-colored honey is 

 by no means always the best. 



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