Report of the Agricultural Committee. 17. 



Mf. Bojer exhibited at the monthly meetings of the Roval 

 Society of October and November 1847 some interesting 

 experiments with lime, which are thus recorded in the mi- 

 nutes of its proceedings. 



« Mr. Bojer, in presence of the meeting, performed some 

 » experiments to show the effects of different sorts of lime 

 » in clarifying cane juice. In these experiments the effect 

 » of the common quick-lime generally used in this process 

 » throughout the Island, was compared with that of lime 

 » prepared by Mr. Bojer from fragments of Oyster shells 

 » calcined before the Blowpipe. Mr. Bo er mixed in a 

 » matrass, one third of a grain of the pure protoxyde of 

 » calcium thus prepared, with 11,000 grains of the juice of 

 » Canes grown at Mapou : the matrass was placed in boil- 

 » ing water, when, as the temperature of the juice rose, 

 » flakes were observed in it. These were the gummy and 

 T> mucilaginous parts, which, in a few minutes, coagulated on 

 » the surface of the mixture, leaving the rest perfectly 

 » clear and limpid. The juice thus clarified never exceed- 

 » ed the temperature of 162 Fah., that is 50 degrees below 

 ♦* the 'beiling point of water. This experiment repeated 

 » Avith the juice of canes grown in Plaines Wilhems, produ- 

 » ced a similar satisfactory result.)) 



» Mr. Bojer now added to 8,000 grains of the same Ma- 

 » pou juice, one third of a grain of common lime preserved 

 » in a ground stoppered phial, but that appearing to have 

 » no effect on the liquid, tho' heated by being immersed in 

 » boiling water, he added the second and third portion, in 

 » all a grain ; still no effect was visible. On the addition 

 » of a further third of a grain the process of clarification be- 

 lt gan, but not .even then was the effect so great as that 

 » produced in the previous experiments by the one third 



