FARMERS' INSTITUTES. 413 



A DIGRESSION. 



Suffer me to turn aside for a little to call your attention to the large amount 

 of starch and chemically similar substances found in these corns. The average 

 amount of sugar in these specimens is equal to 3.G1 pounds in each bushel, and 

 the average amount of starch is 34,1 pounds in each bushel of corn. Nine 

 pounds of starch by boiling for a short time with dilute sulphuric acid will 

 make ten pounds of glucose, or artificial grape sugar; the gum may also be 

 changed to glucose by the same process. The boiling is usually effected by 

 sending steam through iron pipes placed in tlie dilute acid and starch ; the acid, 

 dissolves some of the iron and thus forms sulphate of iron or copperas, much 

 of which remains in solution. When the starch is all converted into sugar, 

 the acid is neutralized by adding lime to the syrup ; sulphate of lime or "plas- 

 ter" is thus formed, and some of this also remains in solution in the syrup. You 

 thus see tliat the materials for making this starch sugar are cheap, and the manu- 

 facture is comparatively simple. If we estimate 13 pounds of this sugar to a 

 gallon of syrup, a bushel of corn would make 3^ gallons of "golden drips." 

 If you sell your corn for fifty cents a bushel and buy this syrup for seventy-five 

 cents a gallon, you buy back your corn at the rate of two and a half dollars a 

 bushel, and somebody has made two dollars by the transaction ! You may con- 

 sole yourselves that you buy back more than you sold. You have, and I will 

 show you what you have got extra, namely, "plaster" and "copperas." 



Is not that a dainty dish 

 To set before the king? 



I prize corn as an article of food when cooked in almost any form, but I do 

 not hanker for this syrup. Is it really fit for liuman food? One reason why 

 so many frauds and cheats are in the market is that so many persons demand 

 cheaj) things as the first condition, no matter what the quality. From cheap to 

 cheat there is only the change of a single letter. I am no friend of lavish 

 expenditure, but "there is that withholdeth more than is meet, hut it tendeth 

 to poverty J ^ In the long run a man must pay a fair price for a fair article : if 

 he pays less than this, he either cheats or gets cheated. 



RELATIONS OF THE ALBUMINOIDS TO STOCK-FEEDING. 



I have thus far spoken mainly in regard to the carbohydrates, and their rela- 

 tion to the fattening of animals. But the albuminoids are of the first impor- 

 tance in feeding of stock for two reasons : 1. Because they build up and repair 

 the waste of the muscular and nervous systems of animals. 2. Because their 

 presence in the food enables the animal to digest a larger amount of the 

 coarser portions of food than can be digested when the supply of nitrogenous 

 food is deficient. One of the most important principles in stock-feeding is 

 that the amount of carbonaceous and of nitrogenous food must bear a certain 

 relation to each other in order to secure complete digestion of both. If either 

 class is very deficient, a quantity of the other class will remain undigested, 

 and will be wasted as food : the digestive system may adapt itself to slight 

 variations from this standard, but if the variation is marked and continued 

 for any length of time, there will be a waste of food material. If cattle are 

 fed with a large excess of nitrogenous food, the excess is for the most part 

 thrown out in the excretions, and is nearly a complete loss as food ; the same 

 holds true of carbonaceous food. The excess in both cases will increase the 

 manure pile, but will not materially benefit the animal. This loss may be 



