24 CULTURE OF THE SUGAR BEET. 



King of Prussia, has ordered me to establish on my two estates of Upper and Lower 

 Cunern, near Wohlen, in Lower Silesia, a practical school for instruction as complete 

 as possible, to make known to our people as well as to foreigners the processes em- 

 ployed in the extraction of sugar from beet roots. 



He further states that he had three distinct methods for extraction, 

 using neither lime, carbonate of lime, milk, sulphuric acid, nor alum, 

 except for beets of poor quality, or toward spring when vegetation has 

 commenced. By the new method he succeeded in getting concrete 

 sugar in twenty-four hours. The three methods of separating the sugar 

 from sirups of beet juices are: 1, by regular crystallization; 2, by 

 granulation ; 3, by immediate conversion into bastard sugar. By the 

 first method 1 quintal of juice gives 5 Silesian pounds of sugar. By the 

 second G pounds are obtained, and by the third method, which is prefer- 

 able to all others, the sugar may be extracted in twenty four hours, 

 yieldiug 5 pounds of raw sugar. 



This notice of Achard is followed by one from the Royal Begency 

 of Silesia, upon the establishments of Achard, stating that — 



His Majesty the King of Prussia, in giving to M. Achard a considerable sum of 

 money, prescribed that he should establish and maintain upon his estate, and at his 

 own cost, a factory for instruction in the manufacture of sugar from beets. 



In the month of December of last year (1811), Achard having announced to the 

 Royal Regency that he had established two factories — one factory on a small scale 

 and such as could be united with farm management, the other to manufacture sugar 

 on a large scale ; that the building for lodging students was finished and ready to re- 

 ceive them; that the course of instruction would commence in January; and that he 

 would be nattered to see an official examination of his work — we consequently ap- 

 pointed for this purpose two intelligent persons, who found that the buildings in- 

 tended for the manufacture were actually completed, and provided with the apparatus 

 and machinery necessary. It also appears from this report that since January 12 

 (1812), the manufacture has been in full activity, and that besides the students there 

 were employed in the factory a foreman, nine male, and four female laborers. During 

 the course of instruction 20 quintals are worked upon daily. Five pounds of raw sngar 

 per quintal [110 pounds] are extracted, and, according to exact calculations made at 

 the factory, it follows that 100 quintals of beets give a net profit of something more 

 than 111 thalers current money. 



This model factory and school of Achard attracted students from nearly 

 all the nations of the continent, and it is probable that it was the stu- 

 dents he had from Russia who carried back to their country the germs 

 of this industry, which has now become so powerful there, and which in 

 that country received its establishing impulse through the aid and en- 

 couragement extended by the imperial authority ; for it is related that 

 General Blankenagel, who founded a factory in the government of Toula, 

 at the village of Akabef, had received from the Czar of Russia a gift of 

 50,000 roubles ($38,895), and that a ukase or edict of the Emperor gave 

 the assurance that all lands of those establishing sugar factories should 

 be free from tax. 



Such, then, was the progress ' attained in this new and valuable in- 

 dustry, and its condition in the beginning of 1814, during which memor- 

 able year what .had bid fair to be a great source of national wealth and 



