216 AGRICULTURAL REPORT. 
or $1,000, per acre to the government. . The presence of a sugar Imanu- 
factory or distillery always made money: plenty in the neighborhood, 
though the French agriculturists are generally a poor class. . 
In regard to the development of this industry in England, Professor 
Church states his belief that all former failures in raising the beet were 
the result of mistakes in the process of culture, and were in nowise due 
to any lack of adaptation either of climate or soil. The culture will 
ultimately be as successful as on the continent. English farmers will 
yet grow from twenty to thirty tons per acre, getting 16s. per ton, and 
receiving back pulp for stock-feeding at 13s. per ton. The crude liquor, 
embracing four-fifths of the potash abstracted from the soil, will prob- 
ably be given to the farmer for a fertilizer, on condition of merely carting 
it away. 
The Professor contends that thorough culture is essential to success. 
Jt would be necessary to experiment fully and accurately to determine 
which variety of the beet is best suited to the soil and climate. The 
soil must be finely pulverized and free from stones. The tendency to 
too great a production of leaf should be restrained, as this diminishes 
the percentage of sugar. <A good root will sink in water. The grow- 
ing roots should be so earthed up that their color will not be distin- 
guishable, for the reason that when raised aboye the soil there is great 
resistance to the formation of the tap root; the plant will not develop 
itself regularly, and the result is a root forked and contracted and poor 
in sugar. The top layer of an exposed root will yield only 5 per cent. 
of sugar, the next layer 64, and so on to 16 or 18 per cent. in a beet yield- 
ing but 10 per cent. 
He holds that a mixed soil, not too easily dried, is best for the beet. 
The alkaline matter should not be in large proportion for sugar, but for 
Spirit manufacture this circumstance is not so important. Deep plow- 
ing is a requisite to success, and even double plowing is desirable. 
Seed should be sown by the middle of April. A fair average yield 
would be twenty tons of beets and fifteen tons of leaves. He stated that 
these twenty tons of beets would remove from an acre of land one hun- 
dred and eighty pounds of potash, fifty pounds of phosphoric acid, 
thirty-two pounds of magnesia, eighteen pounds of sulphuric acid, and 
Sixty-seven pounds of nitrogen. Thirty-five bushels of wheat, weighing 
Sixty-two pounds each, would take from an acre of land only twelve 
pounds of potash and eighteen pounds of phosphoric acid, or but thirty 
pounds of solid earthy matter; and that, while twenty tons of beets take 
away three hundred and forty-seven pounds of solid matter and nitro- 
gen, their leaves extract nearly five hundred pounds more. Of these, 
potash and phosphoric acid are the most valuable ingredients of the soil, 
and their waste should be supplied by manuring with the refuse matter 
of the sugar manufacture. The waste liquor of distillation alone con- 
tains three-fourths of the abstracted potash. The manure of animals 
fed upon the pulp and the leaves would nearly embody the remaining 
fourth. 
‘Of beets sown on the grounds of the agricultural college, the manure 
having been applied for four years, the following percentages of sugar 
were found in harvestings at different periods, viz: August 10, 8.70 per 
cent.; August 24, 9.20; September 7, 9.77; September 21, 10.48; Octo- 
ber 5,12. It was said that another fortnight’s growth would have raised 
the percentage to 13 or 14. The formation of sugar may be tested by 
the growth of the leaves, undue vigor in the latter meaning loss in the 
former. An easy test is to take up a few roots and rasp them with a 
bread grater, and find the specific gravity of the juice. I£ the bulb 
