REPORT 



ox 



THE SUGAR BEET IX FRANCE AND THE UNITED 



STATES. 



CHAPTEE I. 



THE EAELY HISTOEY OF THE SUGAE BEET AND THE MANUFACTURE 

 OF SUGAE THEEEFEOM. 



It is difficult to trace the exact origin of this plant, which has become 

 of "so much interest and value in Europe, and is not only of national 

 but also of continental importance to the people of the other side of the 

 Atlantic. Its antiquity finds evidence in the fact that Theophrastus 

 described two varieties : the deep-red, and the white beet. Olivier de 

 Serres, in his writings in 1590, makes mention only of the red beet, 

 and states that it had not long been introduced into Europe, and says 

 that " the juice yielded on boiling is similar to sugar sirup." This va- 

 riety was introduced in England in 1548, but the white variety was not 

 known until 1570. 



According to the Abbe Eosier, four varieties were already known in 

 17S2, the small and large red, the yellow, and the white. The variety 

 known as disette, and which is still grown in France for feeding pur- 

 poses, was believed to have originated in Germany. It was brought into 

 notice by Tilmorin, the ancestor of the present head of the great seed 

 house of Tilmorin, Andrieux & Co., who died in 1804, and was intro- 

 duced by Perkins into England in 17S6. 



The root does not seem to have been considered as having an indus- 

 trial value, and was cultivated only for the table or for cattle food until 

 1717, when Margraff, a member of the Berlin Academy of Sciences, 

 believing sugar to be a regular constituent of plants other than the 

 sugar-cane, made examination of different varieties of vegetables, and 

 succeeded in separating from several kinds varying quantities of erystal- 

 lizable sugar. His method of research consisted in cutting the material 

 to be examined into thin slices, rapidly drying it, reducing to fine 

 powder, and exhausting with diluted alcohol. The results of his re- 

 searches were announced in a memoir read before the Berlin Academy 

 of Sciences, in the year above mentioned. Of all the plants examined, 

 he found the beet to be the richest in sugar, and believing that Europe 



