Honey

HONEY, is the product of flowers, chiefly of the base of the pistil, where it serves to entangle the pollen. It may, by alcohol, be separated into two parts, yellow and fluid, and white and solid. It is separated from the combs by beat ing and stirring them in water, and then squeezing the honey through a cloth. Candia and the Levant produce the best, in rocks and hollow trees. And it is sometimes made from ripe grapes, by evaporating must to a syrup ; or collect ed from trees, as left by other insects. The whole economy of bees bespeaks design, purpose, and intelligence in the insects, under habits adapted to their powers and form.

Honey differs much in color and in consistence ; it contains much saccharine matter, and, probably, some mucilage, from which it derives its softness and viscosity. Honey very readily enters into the vinous fermentation, and yields a strong liquor, called mead. There are two species of honey ; the one is yellow, transparent, and of the consistence of turpentine ; the other white, and capable of assuming a solid form, and of concret ing into regular spheres. These two species are often united ; they may be separated by means of alcohol, which dissolves the liquid honey much more readily than the solid. Honey has never

been accurately analyzed, but some late experiments go to prove it to be com posed of sugar, mucilage, and an acid. The honey made in mountainous coun tries is more highly flavored than that of low grounds. The honey made in the spring is more esteemed than that ga thered in the summer ; that of the sum mer more than that of the autumn. There is also a preference given to that of young swarms. Yellow honey is ob tained, by pressure, from all sorts of honey-combs, old as well as new, and even from those whence the virgin-honey has been extracted. The combs are broken, and heated, with a little water, in basins or pots, being kept constantly stirred ; they are then put into bags of thin linen cloth, and these in a press, to squeeze out the honey. The wax stays behind in the bag, excepting some par ticles, which pass through with the honey.

Honey is supposed to undergo no alte ration in the body of the bee, as it retains the odor, and not unfrequently the qual ities, of the plants it was gathered from, so that it is sometimes deleterious, where poisonous shrubs abound.