16 CULTURE OF THE SUGAR BEET. 



Immediately after this the Emperor issued the following decree, dated 

 August 22, 1810: 



Considering that the economical manufacture of sugar from grapes essentially in- 

 fluences the prosperity of agriculture and commerce, and desiring to give to this im- 

 portant branch of the industry a particular mark of our special protection, we have 

 decreed and do decree as follows : 



Article 1. On June 1, 1811, the sum of 200,000 francs ($40,000) shall be distributed 

 among twelve establishments which shall have made the largest quantity of sugar from 

 grapes. 



Art. 2. The distribution shall be made among the twelve establishments propor- 

 tionally to the quantity of sugar that each one shall have made. 



ART. 3. To secure the right of competition it shall be necessary to have made at 

 least 10,000 kilograms (22,000 pounds) of sugar. 



Art. 4. The quantities of sugar made shall be verified by a commissioner appointed 

 for that purpose by the prefect of the department and certified to by the mayor of the 

 place. 



Art. 5. The prefect shall address these evidences to our minister of the interior be- 

 fore May 1, 1811. He shall also send at the same time a sample of the sugar made. 



Art. 6. Our minister of the interior shall make to us a report to this effect. He 

 shall make known to us at the same time the manufacturers who have perfected the 

 processes of manufacture and shall propose to us the recompenses and encouragements 

 they shall have merited. 



But while these encouragements were being given to the enterprise of 

 producing sirup and sugar from grapes in the south to replace the colo- 

 nial staple in the home consumption of France, the results of Achard's 

 later work, as described in his letter to the editor of the Moniteur in 1808, 

 had awakened anew the interest in the beet root as a source of sugar in 

 the north, and M. Deyeux, reporter of the first committee of the Insti- 

 tute, which conducted the experiments of 1800, in compliance with a re- 

 quest made through the Institute by the minister of the interior, again 

 undertook to repeat in 1809 and 1810 the experiments of the former com- 

 mittee, and the later work of Achard, with such modifications as he 

 deemed advisable and practicable. In this work he was associated with 

 Mr. Barruel, chief of the chemical department of the School of Medicine 

 of Paris, and their labors were rewarded by the production of a certain 

 quantity of muscovado, which they refined and thus secured " two loaves 

 of sugar, perfectly crystallized, of great whiteness, brilliant and sono- 

 rous, in a word enjoying all the properties of the finest cane sugar," one 

 of which was presented by the minister of the interior to the Emperor, 

 who is said to have " received it with that benevolence which he accords 

 to every useful object." But these experiments, while they showed the 

 practicability of extracting sugar from the beet root by the means pro- 

 posed, were still not of a character to show the net cost of producing 

 the sugar, because the experimenters viewed the work only in a chemi- 

 cal sense. Messrs. Barruel and Isnard then undertook to determine this 

 part of the question, and repeated these experiments just mentioned, 

 keeping strict accounts of the cost of each stage of the processes applied 

 and the quantities of the products obtained. It was found that by their 

 processes they were aide to extract 1.5 per cent, of muscovado, which 



