The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1871-07-11
For the American Bee Journal.
The Poison of the Honey Bee rs n
Medicine.

Hive and Honey Bee,' published in '53
| said -
Gan intelligent Mandingo African in
formed lady of my acquaintance, that
they do not in his country, dare to cat
unsealed honey until it is first boiled. In
some of the Southern States all unsealed
honey is generally rejected. 1t appears
to me highly probable that the noxious
qualities of the honey gathered from some
flowers, is for the most part evaporated
before it is sealed over by the bees; while
the honey is thickening in the cells
Boiling the honey would of course cxpel
it more effectually, and it is well ascer-
tanned fact that some persons are not
able to eat the best honey with impunity
until after it is boiled l believe that if
persons who are injured by honey, would
subject it to this operation, they would
usually find it to exert no injurious in
huence on the system"
II have met with individuals upon
whom sting produced the singular effect
of causing their breath to smell like the
venom of the enraged insect"
"While the poison of most snakes and
many other noxious animals affects only
the circulating system,and may therefore
be swallowed with IMMUNITY, the poison
of the bee acts powerfully, not only upon
the circulating system, but upon the Or
gans of digestion"
can old writer recommends powder
of dried bees for distressing cases of stop
pages; and some Of the highest medical
authorities have recently recommended a
tea made by pouring boiling water upon
bees for the spine complaint. while the
homeopathic physicians employ the poi
son Of the bee, which they call apis, for q
great variety of maladies. That it is
capable of producing intense headaches,
any one who has been stung, or who has
tasted the poison, very we'll knows.
"Bees often thrust out their sting, in a
threatening manner, even when they do
not make an attack; when extruded from
its sheath, it exhibits a minute drop of
poison on its point, the odor of which is
quickly preceived, and some Of it is &C.
easionally firted into the eye of the api.
arian, causing considerable itching" Ed
.tion of 1857.
have known for many years that
many of the peculiar effects produced up.
on the human system by honey, where
owing mainly if not entirely, to the poi.
son Of the bee in the honey eaten. l
know of no one before me who has called
the attention of medical men to this i'm
portant fact.
Every experienced bee-keeper knows
that it is next to impossible to remove
honey from hive without exciting the
bees the least tap upon the hive causes
them to thrust out their stings, and thus
to bedew the combs with their poison, SO
that every disturbing influence causes an
etfusion Of more or less poison, even when
the honey is not, at the time of this dis
turbance, taken from the hive This
poison, adhering to and drying upon the
honey comb, will, for very considerable
time, be active in its effects. 1t is q
well-known fact that some persons cannot
eat even very little honey without dis
tressing collie pains and have repeat.
eddy demonstrated that if the honey is
boiled, or brought nearly to the boiling
point, such persons can eat it with inn.
punity-while they cannot eat safely
small quantity Of leaf sugar in which some
Of this bee-poison has been put. As the
bee-poison is very volatile, slightly boil.
ing the honey seems to dissipate it entire.
ly.
The fact that there is almost always
more or less bee.poison in the honey of
commerce, and that many of the peculiar
symptoms caused by eating honey are at
tributed to this poison, "opens new source
OF inquiry to the medical world and
they can now use the vast stores Of facts
and opinions as to the medical virtues of
honey, furnished by Aristotle, Hippocra-
test Galen, Pliny, and host of old and
medical authors.
1t is obvious from these remarks, that
the remarkable effects claimed by the
homeopathists to be produced upon the
human system by the bee poison, and
which they regarded as quite a recent
discovery, may be traced back almost to
the remotest antiquity,an found to have
equally important relations to the old
schools of medicine.
Schuckard, in his recent work on
British Bees" says: "The earliest man
uscript extant,which is the medical papy-
rus, now in the Royal Collection at Der.
lin, and of which Brugsch has has given
fac-simile and translation, dates from
the nineteenth or twentieth Egyptian dy.
nasty, accordingly from the reign Of
Ramsis H., and goes back to the four
teenth before our era. But portion Of
this papyrus indicates much higher an.
tiquity, extending as far back as the per-
iod of the soverigns who built the pyra.
mids, consequently to the very earliest
period of the history of the world.
ut was one Of the medical treaties
contained within the tempal of Utah, at
Memphis, and which the Egyptian ply.
sieians were required to use in the prac
tice of their profession, and if they neg
lected such use, they became responsible
tor the death Of such patients who sue
cumbed under their treatment, it being
attributed to their contravening the sacred
prescriptions. This pharmacopeia en-
umerates amongst its many ingredients,
honey, wine, and milk we have thus ex.
tremely early positive evidence of the
cultivation of bees. That they had been
domesticated for use in those remote
times is further shown by the fact men,
toned by Sir Gardiner Wilkinson, of a
hive being represented upon an ancient
tomb at Thebes.
ut may have been in consequence of
some traditional knowledge of the ancient
medical practice of the Egyptians, that
Mahomet in his Koran, prescribes honey
rs medicine. One of the Suras, or
nhantara Of thnt ruo-Ir :. a....ll -