FEEDING. 863 



for six or seven cents, in a liquid state ! It must be perfectly 

 obvious that to sell an ill-flavored article at a high price, un- 

 der the pretence that it is a superior article, is nothing less 

 than downright cheating. 



I am well aware that many persons imagine that if any 

 sweet is fed to bees, they will quickly change it into the 

 purest nectar ; but there is no more truth in such a conceit, 

 than there would be in that of a man virho supposed that he 

 had found the veritable philosopher's stone, by which he 

 could transmute our copper and silver coins into the purest 

 gold ! Bees to be sure, can make white and beautiful comb, 

 from almost any kind of sweet ; because wax is a natural se- 

 cretion, (see p. 77,) and can be made from any saccharine 

 substance ; just as fat can be put upon the ribs of an ox, by 

 any kind of nourishing food. 



" But," some of my readers may ask, " do you mean to 

 assert that bees do not secrete honey out of the raw mate- 

 rial which they gather, or which is furnished to them, just 

 as cows secrete milk from grass and hay ?" I certainly do 

 mean to assert that they can do nothing of the kind, and no 

 intelligent man who has carefully studied their fiabits, will 

 for a moment venture to affirm that they can, unless for the 

 sake of " filthy lucre," he is attempting to deceive an un- 

 wary community. What bee-keeper does not know, or 

 rather ought not to know that the quality of honey depends 

 entirely upon the sources from whence it is gathered ; and that 

 apple-blossom honey, white clover honey, buckwheat honey, 

 and every other kind, each has its own peculiar flavor, which 

 can readily be recognized by any good judge of the 

 article. 



When bees are engaged in rapidly storing honey in their 

 combs, they may be seen, as soon as they return from the 

 fields, or froia the feeding boxes, putting their heads at once 



