PREPARATION OF RICE 375 



Chaff ond the whole and broken kernels. The grain is now of a mixed yellow and 

 white color. To remove the outer skin the grain is put in huge mortars holding 

 from 4 to 6 bushels each and pounded with pestles weighing 350 to 400 pounds. 

 Strange to say, the heavy weight of the pestle breaks very little grain. 



" When sufficiently decorticated, the contents of the mortars, consisting now of 

 flour, fine chaff, and clean rice of a dull, filmy creamy color, are removed to the 

 flour screens, where the flour is sifted out. From thence the rice and fine chaff go 

 to the fine-chaff fan, where the fine chaff is blown out and mixed with the other flour. 

 The rice flour, as we call it, or more properly 'rice meal,' as our English neighbors 

 call it, is very valuable as stock feed, being rich in carbohydrates as well as albumi- 

 noids. 



" From the fine-chaff fan the rice goes to the cooling bins, rendered necessary by 

 the heavy frictional process through which it has just passed. It is allowed to 

 remain here for eight or nine hours, and then passes to the brush screens, whence the 

 smallest rice and what little flour is left pass down one side and the larger rice down 

 the other. 



" The grain is now clean and ready for the last process — polishing. This is 

 necessary to give the rice its pearly luster, and it makes all the difference imaginable 

 in its appearance. The polishing is effected by friction against the rice of pieces of 

 moose hide or sheepskin tanned and worked to a wonderful degree of softness, 

 loosely tacked around a double cylinder of wood and wire gauze. From the pol- 

 ishers the rice goes to the separating screens, composed of different sizes of gauze, 

 where it is divided into its appropriate grades. It is then barreled and is ready for 

 market. 



" In mills more recently erected the foregoing process has been modified by sub- 

 stituting the * huller ' for the mortar and pounder. The huller is a short, cast iron, 

 horizontal tube with interior ribs and a funnel at one end to admit the rice. Within 

 this tube revolves a shaft with ribs. These ribs are so adjusted that the revolution 

 of the shaft creates the friction necessary to remove the cuticle. The rice passes 

 out of the huller at the end opposite the funnel. It resembles externally a large 

 sausage machine. It requires six hullers for each set of burs. The automatic 

 sacker and weigher is used instead of barreling, sacks being preferred for shipping 

 the cleaned rice. Sheepskins are used for polishing. 



" With the above modifications of the milling processes considerable reduction 

 has been made in the cost of the mill. Mills of a daily capacity of 60,000 pounds 

 of cleaned rice can now be constructed at a total cost of ^10,000 to ^15,000." 



Mills are now constructed suited to plantation use which 

 combine all the operations in one machine, receiving the rough 

 rice or paddy as it comes from the thresher and turning out 

 clean rice ready for use. While the polish is not so high as in 

 the more complicated processes, the product answers the require- 

 ment of rice eating. 



In the preparation of rice for market it is important to have 



