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The Swarm: Pliny

Doubtless extracted honey is sometimes adulterated by dealers with cheap syrups and it is interesting to know that the adulteration of honey is an ancient as well as a modern fraud, for Pliny tells us that the must of grapes was boiled down to the consistency of honey and used for its adulteration.

To-day the cheap and harmful glucose or corn-syrup supplants the must of grapes as an adulterant, just enough honey being added to flavor the compound.

The color of the comb and of the honey depends doubtless upon the flowers from which the nectar is gathered, and from a note in the Koran we learn that, - "The Arabs are curious in and fond of honey. Meccca alone affords eight or nine varieties, green, white, red and brown."