SURPLUS HONEY IN BOXES AND EXTRACTED. 73 



THE BEE-KEEPING INDUSTRY. 



Palewtine was called "a land that floweth with milk and honey," and 

 with more truth, may the same be applied to our own country. Until 

 two centuries ago, honey held its place as the great sweet of the world. 

 The art of refining sugar, caused it to be left far behind, because the bee- 

 keeper still pursued the old plan of annually murdering his faithful 

 workers, to get their stores. 



Honey has ever been considered of great medicinal power in certain 

 classes of diseases, and is very palatable to a large proportion of people, 

 but the small supply of the article and the inferiority of that which 

 under old methods of squeezing and draining from the mashed combs 

 caused it to fall into comparative disuse. But within a generation 

 greater strides have been made in the development of this industry 

 than in any other. Sugar can be produced and refined only 

 with a great amount of capital, but every family throughout the land 

 can help to swell the products of this industry and tho number of both 

 large and small bee-keepers is increasing with amazing rapidity. Even 

 the cotton gin added no more to its appropriate industry than has the 

 various improvements of movable comb hives, extractors, comb-founda- 

 tion, queen rearing, wax machines, smokers, modes of wintering and 

 means of protecting the person from stings, added to the bee-keeping 

 industry. We cannot too strongly reiterate the absolute necessity now 

 for these improvements, To do without them now, in bee-culture is as 

 bad as the man who attempts to ' ' seed cotton " for a living in these days 

 of cotton gins and steam manufacturing: mills. 



In speaking of this great industry we know not hardly where to begin. 

 There are now three or four magazines devoted exclusively to the sub- 

 ject. Many bee-keepers' conventions, State, local, and national, have 



