PROCEEDINGS OF THE POLYTECHNIC ASSOCIATION. 797 



and the intimate relation between that industry and agriculture, 

 called for improved methods of culture, and a more intelligent and 

 scientific application of labor. Intelligence and education were 

 decentralized for the benefit of the whole country ; capital also 

 lent its powerful aid, and agriculture made rapid progress; while 

 the condition of the laborers was also materially improved. 



Louis Napoleon, the present Emperor of the French, when he 

 w^as imprisoned at Ham, in 1842, said of the beet sugar industry 

 in his "Analyse de la Question des Sucres : " "It retains workmen 

 in the country, and gives them employment in the dullest months 

 of the year ; it difluses among the agricultural classes good 

 methods of culture, calling to their aid industrial science, and the 

 arts of practical chemistry and mechanics. It multiplies the centres 

 of labor. It promotes, in consequence, those sound principles 

 upon which rest the organization of society, and the security of 

 governments ; for the prosperity of a people is the basis of public 

 order. # * # 



" Wherever the beet is cultivated, the value of land is enhanced, 

 the wages of the workmen are increased, and the general pros- 

 perity is promoted." 



In another place the same author puts the following words in 

 the mouth of the sugar industry: " Respect me, for I improve the 

 soil. I make land fertile, which, without me, Avould be unculti- 

 vated. I give employment to laborers, wlio otherwise would be 

 • idle. I solve one of the greatest problems of modern society. I 

 organize and elevate labor." 



The conclusions to which I have arrived are, — 



That the skill, which is the result of the experience of more 

 than a century, and which has made France independent of for- 

 eign countries for her supply of sugar, is available for us to-day. 



That the manufacture of beet sugar can be successfully trans- 

 ^ planted from France to the United States. 



That sugar can be produced in this country from the beet nearly 

 if not quite as cheaply as it can be from the cane in Cuba, or any 

 other country. 



That the protection of transportation alone is sufficient to render 

 it impossible for the sugar of tropical climates to compete with 

 beet sugar in the United States. 



That as the climate of the southern States does not permit the 

 cane to ripen, and as the yield of sugar from unripe cane is com- 



