496 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST, 



[January i, 1884. 



and other materials, either entirely made of China gi'ass, 

 or into which it entered as a component part. 



It i^ remarked, iu conclusion, that the cause of the 

 leading position held by cotton is the low price of articles 

 made from it. A serious competition is not to be looked 

 for, it is considered, on the part of flax, but it is sug- 

 gested that China grass, if its price is reduced, may be 

 found for certain purposes an important rival of cotton. 

 — Journal of the Society of .-iW.s-. 



THE QUEENSLAND SUGAR DISTRICTS. 



Two years have not yet elapsed since the Colonial Sugar 

 Company obtained leave, by a special act of the Legis- 

 iatm-e, to pui'chase certain lands at Mackay anvl on the 

 Herbert River, whereon to cultivate sugarcane and erect 

 sugar-manufacturing works. Since that date a Large area 

 of land has been put imder cane, 10 miles of permanent 

 railway laid down, two bridges constructed, and a large 

 sugar-mill erected. For this year about 1,500 tons of raw 

 sugar \vill be produced, and, all things being favourable, 

 next season will see about three times that quantity 

 manufactured; but the ultimate total production is to 

 exceed 6,000 tons per annum. The manufacture of sugar 

 on so extensive a scale by a single company naturally 

 attracts a considerable amount of attention, and more 

 particularly as several very important innovations in the 

 system of manufacture have been made. The most imj ort- 

 ant of these is the double crushing or luiliiug. Hitherto 

 ;dl the Queensland planters have satisfied themselves with 

 obtaining 65 per cent of the weight of the cane in juice, 

 notwithstanding that large planters in other colonies have 

 long since either made use of double crushing, or, as in 

 the Mauritius, of the lately-patented DefribreUr-Faure. The 

 Honourable "William Russel, of Demerara, is the man 

 whose name is most intimately connected with the pract- 

 ical success of double crushing. At Homebush the cane 

 is groimd by a set of three 6 feet rollers, the megass 

 from which is sprinkled by means of a jet with about 

 13 per cent of hot water, is then carried through a 5 

 feet roller mill, where it gives up 15 per cent more of 

 juice, making a total of 80 per cent of juice for the total 

 crushing. The megass finally ejected is naturally very dry, 

 and contrary to the usual barbarous custom, it is not 

 spread in the yard to dry, but is elevated into traveUing 

 bins, and thence thrown down shoots direct into the furnaces. 

 In consequence of tlie- thorough miUing it goes through, 

 there remains in the megass httle combustible matter, 

 and the deficiency has to be supplied with firewood. As 

 yet the crushing (miUing) is not up to the standard ; the 

 fieeders at the rollers, being new to work, have not yet 

 mastered the difficulty of regular feeding, but improvei lent 

 in this direction is a mere matter of time. The mill and 

 the greater part of the machinery are by Mirrlees, "W^atson, 

 & Co. The juice is clarified by means of the clay 

 (sulphate of alumina, process, and the water evaporated 

 in the two sets of triple-effets — the first to work at Mackay. 

 The scum and waste from the clarifiers and subsiders is put 

 through the filter-presses, of which there are 10. The 

 presses and triple-effets are by the Fives-Lille Company. 

 The vacuum pans do their boilhng in three hours and a 

 half, the pumps being supplied by Fletcher & Co. The 

 sugar is dried warm; it is not washed in t!ie centrifugals, 

 the oViject here being simply to produce raw sugar for the 

 Mcib'urne and Sydney refineries. To save labour again 

 the dried sugar is dropped from the centrifugals on to an 

 endless band, whence it is raised in an elevator, thrown 

 into a hopper, and from there dra\vn off into the bags 

 waiting for it below. The above gives a fair idea of the 

 general arrangement and working in the mill, and shows 

 how lUfferently and in what a superior way the crmpany 

 are managing their work.s to what is usually done in 

 Queensland. 



No sugar-mill producing the large quantity of sugar 

 Homebush is expected to turn out could be economically 

 fed on the old .system of carts and horses, and the Deme- 

 rara system of canalisation being out of the question, 

 a very effective substitute both for economy .and rapidity 

 has been found in the portable railway system known as 

 DfCauWIle's. This is a French system, invented .and manu- 

 factured l\v M. Decauuille at Petit-Bourg, near Paris, and 

 of all the systems he or his assistants have tried, Mr. 

 Knox, the general man.ager of the sugar company, con- 



siders this the best. By means of this tramway access 

 can be had at a few hours' notice to the most distant 

 fields of cane, and when once communication has been 

 estabUshed, the cane is brought in faster than the mill 

 can crush it. Ai-rived at the mill, the car carrying the 

 cane is run on to rails which cross the earner, and from 

 that position the cane is drawn on to the carrier and 

 taken up to the rollers. The saving of laboiu- here is im- 

 mense. To atlmit of continuous crushing — i.e., crushing 

 day and night — a set of sidings are being constructed. A 

 sufficient number of cars with cane ^vill be collected here 

 during the day-time, and worked off during the night. 

 In the yard and on the main roads this railway is a per- 

 manency, but on the fields it is portable. The points in 

 which the Decauville Petit-Bourg sy^em shines over the 

 others are, first^ that this r,ailway is a speciality, the manu- 

 facturers producing nothing but rails, cars, and locomot- 

 ives; that a set of rails come out wedded together in one piece, 

 and hence acquire a stability which is not otherwise ob- 

 tainable (where, as in a field, the rails are frequently taken 

 up, and get knocked about, this is a consideration); that 

 the set of rails fit together in the field without any bolt- 

 ing (which may be done if permanency is desu-ed), which 

 means a saving in time and labour, and as no bolts are 

 used, none can be lost, and secm'ity against loss of bolts 

 and stoppage of work aro insured. The ears have the ad- 

 vantage of being low, so that they are not easily over- 

 turned ; but the most remarkable point about them is their 

 oil or grease box. This box, the Panama box as it is called, 

 when filled with oil will lubricate the axles dui-ing a whole 

 month's continual running. The cars are so hght that a 

 horse can draw 25 empty and eight when full. The buffers, 

 however, do not appear to work well. The only objection 

 in first cost is iu the freight ; the rails coming out in sets 

 take up more room than ordinary rails do. The gauge is 2 

 ft., and there are many miles of this railwayon this estate. 

 The erection of the works was carried on under the super- 

 intendence of Mr. Robertson, who is also the manager. 

 He is a man of intelligence and great energy, and his 

 hospitality is unbounded. His experience in Demerara, 

 Fiji, and on the Richmond River has, together with his 

 natural abiUties, well fitted him for the important position 

 he occupies. — Australasian. 



Essential Oils op Cinnamon and Cassia. — Second report 

 by Mr. A. H. Jackson on "The Differences between the 

 Essential Oils of Cinnamon and Cassia." In his pre\nous 

 report Mr. Jackson dealt chiefly with the physical behaviour 

 of the two oils and stated his opinion that, whilst there 

 was some difference iu their specific gravity and refractive 

 energy, there was nothing sufKciently characteristic to 

 supply a satisfactory method of distinguishing between 

 them. In the present report more pai'ticular attention is 

 pai'l to the chemical aspect of the question. The most 

 promising experiment consisted in a comparison of the 

 behaviour of the residues of the two oils after the removal 

 of all the cinnamaldehyde by treatment with potassium 

 bisulphite and either; but although some slight differences 

 have been noted they are not sufficiently definite to en- 

 courage further work in that direction. — Pharmaceutical 

 Journal. 



A West Afeicav Bark, called " doundake," used by the 

 natives of the Rio Nimez as a febrifuge, has recently' 

 been examined by IMM. Bochefontaine, B. Feris and 

 Marcus {Comptes Eendtis, xcvii., p. 272). The bark is of 

 a reddish-orange colour and is formed of superimposed 

 lamel!r-i, which are easily det.ached from one another. 

 The taste is strongly bitter. The plant yielding the bark 

 is a shrub, and is supposed to belong to the natural order 

 Rubiace.<e. An active principle ofa bitter taste has been 

 obtained from it, .soluble in water and alcohol and possessing 

 an aiVkaline reaction .ind the same physiological action as 

 the bark itself. This substance the .authors regardas an 

 alkaloid, and they have named it " doundakine." The 

 alkaloid possesses poisonous properties, producing in the 

 frog and guinea pig a cataleptic state with gradual failure 

 first of the re.spiratiori and then of the heart's action, 

 In dogs the catalepsy is not so e\ddent. A poison obtained 

 from "the natives of Rio Nunez and used iu chase and 

 in war produced similar effects, and is believed by the 

 authors to contain the same active principle as the doundake 

 bark. — Pharmaceutical Journal. 



