646 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[February i, 1883, 



we have of sugar ai-e from the peas of Pliny and 

 Dioscorides, the latter a sort of army surgeon, who 

 accompanied the Roman legions in the first ceutury of 

 our era. What their description simply amuuu's to 

 is that it was a sort of concreted houcy found upon 

 canes in India, of the consistency of salt, and like it, 

 brittle between the teeth. It was used at Rome as 

 a medicine. Now, as the art of refining sugar and of 

 making loaf-sugar was not known until the end of 

 the fifteenth century, it has been very naturally 

 conjectured that the sugar referred to as being in 

 use at Rome, is no other than the sugar-c^ndy of 

 one's boyhood, the art of making which has been 

 known in China from a remote antiquity. It is 

 further known that large quantities of this article 

 have for many centuries been exported to India, 

 and that from thence, small quantities were sent to 

 Rome. As, at least, showing the wide diffusion of 

 the article, we may mention that so late as forty years 

 ago the beautiful white crystals of Chinese sugar- 

 caudy were used for domestic purposes, to the almost 

 total exclusion of every other kind of sugar, by the 

 Europeans at the ditierent settlements of the East. 

 Canton was not only a great tea and silk port, but, 

 in possessing this monopoly, was, as times went, a great 

 sugar port, the annual export amounting to the respect- 

 able figure of 10,000 tons. 



It will thus be seen that the successful introduction 

 of the sugar-refining industry into this colony had, if 

 we may so put it, somewhat like a historical wiurant to 

 authorize its introduction ; and in saying this we do 

 not in any way detract from the credit of those bold 

 spirits who worked so hard and lost so much in placing 

 it on a workable basis. As Hongkong, since its cession, 

 has gradually absorbed whatever of the Canton trade 

 that did not goto the treaty ports, it is natural to expect 

 that it should also have a share in its sugar export, and 

 with its greater facilities more than take up the posi- 

 tion that Canton once held as one of the principal cen- 

 tres of distributiou of refined sugar for the East. With 

 Bugar-producitig countries all round us, sugar ought 

 to become a staple industry here. From the statistics 

 published by the Inspector-General of Customs at 

 Shanghai, and from other sources of information, we 

 learn that the cultivatiun of the sugar cane, and the 

 rough aud ready refining of sugar, is more than ever 

 seriously engaging the attention of Chinese farmers 

 and capitalists on the mainland ; thus indicating that 

 in spite of all drawbacks there incident to such an in- 

 dustry, it posseses witiiiu itself all the elements of 

 success. The native appliances for crushing the cane 

 are of the rudest oonslruction and are propelled by 

 animal labour, usually from fuir to five small oxen. 

 The juice, after being collected in a receptacle in the 

 ground, which holds from twenty to thirty gallons, 

 is removed by hand to the boiling pans. These boil- 

 ing pans are made of cast-iron and are manufactured 

 at Fatshan, near Canton. The principal varieties of 

 sugar made are the candy, the green, and the clayed 

 sugars, of which the first and last are largely ex- 

 ported. In all the three descriptions, the process 

 seems to be tedious, uncertain and wasteful, involv- 

 ing a vast amount of human and animal labour. The 

 , endeavour to get rid of such hampering conditions, 

 together with a desire lo have freed >ni from official 

 interference, in a large measure explains the erection 

 of the refinery by a Chinese Company at Bowrington, 

 East Point. The machinery for this concern, we be- 

 lieve, is supplied by a wellknown Greenock firm. It 

 possesses the latest improvements, and has c st £50,000 

 sterling. We learn that with the exceptions of the man- 

 ager, engineer and one or two others, it is entirely 

 a Chinese speculation and altogether under their 

 control. 



The c.iuses which at present are militating so dis- 

 Bstrouiily against sugar-refining in England and France, 



we imagine, will ultimately conduce to the prosperity 

 of eugar-retining abroad, especially in the East. Ger- 

 many and Austria, in particular, it is well known, 

 are bolstering up at the expense of their ratepayers 

 and of other industries, the manufacture of beet- 

 root sugar, by a system of bounties utterly sub- 

 versive of all prinoiples of free or fair trade. 

 The only remedy for this state of things 

 as far as can be seen at present is the reduction of 

 all intermediate pi'oHts by the transfer of all processes 

 connected with refining to sugar-producing localities. 

 If this is the remedy, and facts tend to show that 

 it i^, the consequence will be the removal of English 

 capital to the sources of production ; and it must be 

 conceded that nowhere is there such a combination of 

 advantages as are to be found in China and the 

 Philippines. In the first place there exist all suitable 

 conditions of climate and of soil, labour is cheap and 

 abundant, refining from the cane is speedily and less 

 expensively efi'ected than from beet, &c., and no other 

 sacchariferons plant surpasses the cane, in the purity 

 of its juice, in its extraordinary vitality and in the 

 prodigality of its yield, and last but not least the 

 constant, almost daily, communication with the prin- 

 cipal sugar-consuming countries by lines of steamers 

 proceeding to both hemispheres. 



That we have an undoubted advantage in possess- 

 ing abundance of cheap labour is borne out by the 

 fact that the sugar-producing countries of Hawaii, 

 Demerara, the iVlauritius, Cuba, Natal (and North 

 Queensland, if we mistake not) have, all in turn and 

 at immense expense, imported field hands from these 

 shores. Even the introduction of Chinese labourers 

 do not solve the difficulty ; for the Chinaman who 

 has a genius for retail shopkeeping, the moment he has 

 capital enough, turns his back on all field work, and 

 sets himself up in a store in the neighbouring village 

 or nearest town. Nay more ; further complications await 

 the planter and the inill-ownerfrom the coolies they have 

 introduced. Referring to the introduction of Chinese 

 labour into Hawaii, Mr. Thrum of Honolulu remarks: — 

 " The very large infiux of Chinese during the early part of 

 the year afforded no apparent relief to sugar and rice 

 plantations in modifying the rates of wages, which have 

 materially advanced since the workings of the treaty 

 were entered upon, as they (the coolies) were found to 

 be under sworn secret society obligations to maintain 

 rates or figures found existing ; and to secure sufficient 

 to break such a monopoly would be to endanger our 

 commercial relations and lose our autonomy." We 

 may remark that, notwithstanding the troubles that 

 afflict the Hawaiian sugar planter, he has been doing 

 very well. The sugar exported to the United States 

 was calculated to be 45,".','i0 tons— not a bad output for 

 a group of mountainous islands of an area not much 

 larger than Yorkshire." 



From the troubles we have mentioned above, employ- 

 ers of labour in China and our neighbours in the Philip- 

 pines are happily to a great extent exempt. The 

 teeming millions of uu killed baldy-fed labourers render 

 combination among this class next to an impossibility, 

 and they are not adverse to emigration to the Philip- 

 pines. Our local line of steamers render the expenses 

 of specially chartering vessels for.emigrauts unnecess- 

 ary ; and the Spanish Governinent, if we know it a' all, 

 is not a Government to stand any nonsense from 

 secret societies or trades-union obligations. When, in 

 the present condition of sugar growing and sugar refin- 

 ing in the Philippines, we find that Manila sugar in the 

 New York market competes to advantage with 

 West India and Louisiana sugars and home sugar 

 made from beet and other saccharine plants, it is 

 a legitimate inference that with a still fuller develop- 

 ment of the trade and with an ultimate reduc- 

 tion of expense oonsecjuent on the introduc- 

 tion of more economical methods of working, and, as 



