lo The Honey-Makers 



and particularly with the part played by it as a fertilizer of 

 the fruits and flowers. 



To fertilize the flowers has always been the office of the 

 bee, as we can see now that the processes of nature are 

 understood. But it cannot so easily be believed that the 

 bee once gave the world the only "sugar" it had, — that 

 is, the only material for sweetening ; yet it is but a few 

 centuries since sugar came into use in Europe. 



The first cane-sugar known in our records came from 

 China, that wonderful secret country which has given us 

 so many of our useful arts. 



Its course was thence to India and Arabia, and between 

 China and these countries it appears to have been for 

 centuries an article of trade. 



Alexander the Great, in that remarkable expedition 

 which did so much to make the West acquainted with 

 the East, is probably responsible for the first knowledge 

 Europe had of sugar, for it is said that his admiral, Near- 

 chus, on the return of his army to Greece b. c. 324, brought 

 with him as a rare and delectable delicacy a quantity of 

 sugar candy. 



The method of making " candy " appears to have been 

 known and extensively practised in China from a very ' 

 remote antiquity, and it was sent in large quantities to ^ 

 India. 



Thus we find candy, so frequently condemned as vain 

 and frivolous, a most venerable and historical commodity, 

 the forerunner of the tremendous sugar industry in the 

 western world at the present time. 



Nearchus's candy was not the varied and delectable 

 confection compounded by the artists of the present day, 

 but probably a very simple sweet. 



Theophrastus, 320 b. c, calls sugar a sort of honey ex- 

 tracted from canes or reeds ; and Dioscorides in the second 



