STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 131 



leaves and leaf-sheaths from the cane. To accomplish this the cane 

 is cut into short sections, and then run through a system of fanning 

 mills the blast of air from which blows out all the light material. 

 The cleaned cane is next cut into fine pieces or chips, and is then 

 ready to go into a cell of the diflFusion battery, where it is subjected 

 to a leaching or soaking process with hot water. Each cell of chips 

 is held under this treatment for sixty or seventy min'utes. 



The diffused juice is said to have taken up and to hold in solution 

 ninety-eight per cent of the total sugars of the diffused chips, and to 

 consist of about half a gallon of water to each gallon of juice obtained 

 from the cane. Milk of lime is used in the usual manner for defeca- 

 tion, and the clarified juice is then evaporated in vacuum to a semi- 

 S5'^rup, and lastly boiled to gridn in the large vacuum or strike pan. 

 Under the most favorable circumstances the time occupied, from cut- 

 ting the cane for cleaning, to dumping the strike of sugar or milada 

 from the vacuum pan, is about twelve hours. 



The encouraging results had with diffusion have fairly brought be- 

 fore the sugar industries of the United States the question of how best 

 to extract the juices from the cane, whether by rolling or grinding 

 in the mill, and thereby obtaining something over fifty per cent, or 

 by diffusion, and thereby securing nearly all the sugars of the cane. 

 It is already evident to practical manufacturers thai the best quality 

 and greatest quantity of product can be obtained from cane which 

 hns been thoroughly cleaned, hence the first and great desideration for 

 the successful manufacturer is a machine which will do this work 

 rapidly and efficiently, whether the juice is to be extracted by milling 

 or by diffusion. 



The advantages of diffusion consist mainly in the large extraction 

 obtained thereby. Diffusion has, however, its disadvantages — first, 

 the diffused juice consists of one hundred parts of juice from the cane 

 to fifty or more parts of water added in the process of diffusion, and 

 thus the relative cost of evaporation is increased nearly sixty percent. 

 Second, the exhausted chips or begasse, being surcharged with water, 

 have no immediate value as fuel. Third, the immediate and deter- 

 mined effect of diffusion is to completely destroy the normal character 

 of the juice. At its best, as expressed by the mill, the juice is very 

 unstable in its character and relative bearings. Fourth, diffusion 

 extracts soluble solids and coloring matter to a great extent, and 

 equally as well as sugar, and these, except such a part of them 

 as may be skimmed off or precipitated, finally incorporate with the 

 sugars, giving a heavy precipitate in a heated solution of the crystal- 



