STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 163 



pile it up in that way and put leaves over it, and he used to de- 

 scribe the manner of piling it. It was a necessity to do this, as 

 he could not work the cane up as fast as it was necessary to cut 

 it. He had to leave it in the field, but he lost very largely by 

 that process. There is no question that those of you who are 

 growing cane want to cut it when it is ripe, and you want to 

 grind it, if you can, the same day it is cut, and run it right 

 through and finish it right up. That is the best use you can 

 make of it. Yon can get more syrup, and that is the best way 

 to dispose of it. 



The Rio Grande folks gather their cane say to-day, and to- 

 morrow every stalk of it is through the mill. They will use up 

 about two hundred tons of cane in twenty-four hours. They put 

 it through the mill right away. They will stake out enough to 

 make two hundred tons, to be cut at one time, and run through 

 the mill within twenty- four hours. Mr. Hughes, the chemist, 

 will go down and examine the product, and if he finds it is not 

 fit to cut he will bring the men home; but when it is ready he will 

 order the men to cut the cane and put the whole thing through 

 as fast as possible. He tests it with the polariscope to see if the 

 cane is ready to go through the mill. Hence they cut it from day 

 to day, regularly, and make sugar as successfully as it is possible 

 to do it. You can readily see that it requires instruction and 

 practice for a considerable period of time to accomplish all this. 

 For instance, the man that was at the vacuum pan when I was 

 at their mill was an old gentleman from Germany. Mr. Hughes 

 asked him: "How long have you run a vacuum?" His reply 

 was, " Thirty -three years." He asked him if he had ever done 

 anything else, and he replied that he had not. That man knew 

 how to boil syrup. He knew when he looked at it whether he 

 would get any sugar. He knew exactly every moment of time 

 whether the process was going on right or not. Mr. Hughes 

 knew whether the boys who had charge of the defecating room 

 understood their work or not. He had two or three boys down 

 in the defecating room attending to the work. They put in the 

 lime and whatever preparation was necessary, and when the 

 defecation was comj^lete they would turn a valve at the bottom 

 of the tank and run the sediment into the scum pan, and when 

 the clear juice commenced to run they had an arrngement by 

 which they could turn it off by a valve, and everything was ar- 

 ranged to work in a perfect manner; everything reduced to a 

 system the most complete, — the cheapest and most practical way 



