SUGAR SUHL 



441 



minated by two-sided, or by three-sided summits. 

 Its specific gravity is 1*4' to 1*6'. The crystals 

 are nearly anhydrous. When exposed to heat, sugar 

 swells up, is decomposed with a peculiar smell, and 

 finally bursts into flames at a temperature somewhat 

 below ignition. When dissolved in one third its 

 weight of water, it forms a syrup, which keeps well 

 in close vessels ; but if considerably diluted with 

 water, it rapidly changes, particularly with contact 

 of air, becoming sour and mouldy. Sugar is hardly 

 soluble in pure alcohol, though proof spirit dissolves 

 it in considerable quantity. Syrups, which have 

 been rendered uncrystallizable, bitter and astringent 

 by combination with lime, barytes, and strontites, 

 resume their original properties, when these bases 

 are separated by the equivalent quantity of sulphu- 

 ric acid. The same holds true with regard to pot- 

 ash and soda. When quicklime is left for several 

 months in combination with syrup, carbonate of 

 lime is deposited in very acute rhomboids, and the 

 sugar is converted into a mucilaginous jelly, of the 

 consistence of .paste. Several other oxides, and 

 especially that of lead, have the power of combining 

 with sugar. Thus, when ground litharge is heated 

 with sugar and water, it is dissolved ; but after a 

 while the liquor becomes opaque, and lets fall a 

 white, insipid, light powder, insoluble in even a 

 great quantity of boiling water, and which is a com- 

 pound, in its dried state, of 100 of sugar, and 139'6 

 of oxide of lead. This saccharate of lead is decom- 

 posed by the feeblest acids, which seize the lead. 

 Subacetate of lead does not precipitate sugar from 

 its solution ; arid as this salt throws down almost 

 every other vegetable and animal substance, it may 

 be employed to separate sugar frofn other matters. 

 Sugar has no action on salts, except at an elevated 

 temperature. With the aid of water, it then re- 

 duces muriate of gold, the nitrates of mercury, 

 and silver, the sulphate of copper, and reduces to 

 the lowest term of oxidation several other salts. 

 Sugar has been analyzed by several chemists. The 

 following is a general view of the results: 



G. Lnisic and Thci 



Oxvgen, 50-G3 



tenon, 42-47 



Hydrogen, 6'90 



49-856 

 43-265 

 6-879 



53-35 

 39-99 

 6-66 



50-33 

 43-38 

 6-29 



100-00 



M. Braconnot has recently extended our views 

 concerning the artificial production of sugar and 

 gum. Sulphuric acid (specific gravity 1 -827) mixed 

 with well dried elm dust, became very hot, and on 

 being diluted with water, and neutralized with 

 chalk, afforded a liquor which became gummy on 

 evaporation. Shreds of linen triturated in a glass 

 mortar, with sulphuric acid, yields a similar gum. 

 Nitric acid has a similar power. If the gummy 

 matter from linen be boiled for some time with 

 dilute sulphuric acid, we obtain a crystallizable 

 sugar, and an acid, which M. Braconnot calls the 

 vegeto-sulphuric acid. The conversion of wood, 

 also, into sugar, will no doubt appear remarkable ; 

 and when persons not familiar with chemistry, are 

 told that a pound of rags can be converted into 

 more than a pound of sugar, they may be disposed 

 to consider the statement as a piece of pleasantry, 

 though nothing can be more true. 



SUGAR-CANE (saccharum officinarurri). The 

 art of cultivating the sugar-cane has been practised 

 in China from the highest antiquity. It was un- 

 known to the ancient Egyptians, Jews, Greeks, or 

 Romans, and did not pass into Arabia till the end 

 of the thirteenth century. From Arabia it was 



carried into Egypt, Nubia, and Ethiopia. The 

 Moors obtained it from Egypt, and the Spaniards 

 from the Moors. In the fifteenth century, the cane 

 was introduced into the Canary islands by the 

 Spaniards, and into Madeira by the Portuguese, 

 and thence into the West India islands and the 

 Brazils. Previous to the year 1466, sugar was 

 known in England chiefly as a medicine ; and, 

 though cultivated in a few places on the Mediter- 

 ranean, it was not more generally us< d on the con- 

 tinent. Now, in point of importance, it ranks next 

 to wheat and rice, among all the products of the 

 vegetable world, and has become the first article of 

 maritime commerce. The Atlantic lias been the 

 principal theatre of this trade, which, more than 

 any other circumstance, contributed to give a new 

 spring to commerce in Europe, and to engraft the 

 curse of slavery upon the new world. The sugar- 

 cane, like the bamboo and Indian corn, belongs to 

 the family of the grasses. It grows to the height 

 of seven or eight feet or more, and its broad leaves, 

 and large, silky panicles, give it a beautiful aspect. 

 The stems are very smooth, shining, and filled with' 

 a spongy pith ; the flowers are small, and very 

 abundant, clothed externally with numerous silky 

 hairs. The sugar-cane flowers only after the lapse 

 of an entire year. In the West Indies, it is propa- 

 gated by cuttings from the root end, planted in hills 

 or trenches in the spring or autumn. The cuttings 

 root at the joints under ground, and from those 

 above, send up shoots, which, in eight, twelve, or 

 fourteen months, are from six to ten feet long, and 

 fit to cut down for the mill. A plantation lasts 

 from six to ten years. (For the process of making 

 sugar, see the preceding article.) The juice of the 

 sugar-cane is so palatable and nutritive, that, 

 during the sugar harvest, every creature which 

 partakes freely of it, whether man or animal, 

 appears to derive health and vigour from its use. 

 The meagre and sickly negroes exhibit at this 

 season a surprising alteration ; and the labouring 

 horses, oxen, and mules, though constantly at work, 

 yet, as they are allowed to eat, almost without re- 

 straint, of the refuse plants and scummings from 

 the boiling house, improve infinitely more than at 

 any other period of the year. The sugar-cane is 

 now cultivated in all the warm parts of the globe. 

 Its growth is constant, but varies in rapidity accord- 

 ing to the situation, the season, or the weather. 

 The variety from Otaheite has lately elicited some 

 attention, as it is said to succeed in soils too poor 

 for the common variety, and to produce four crops, 

 while the other yields only three : the crystalliza- 

 tion is also more regular. The consumption of 

 England alone now amounts to upwards of 

 400,000,000 pounds, which gives an average of 

 about thirty pounds for each individual. In some 

 parts of the U. S. sugar is manufactured to con- 

 siderable extent from the sap of two species of 

 maple. This is superior to the common brown 

 sugar of the West Indies, but probably will event- 

 ually be superseded by that article, on account of 

 its cheapness. See Maple. 



SUGAR OF LEAD. See Lead. 



SUHL, OR SUHLA ; a town in the government 

 of Erfurt, in the Prussian province of Saxony, lying 

 in a romantic valley on the Lauter, on the south- 

 west side of the Tburingian forest. It owes its 

 importance to the mines which were discovered 

 here in the fourteenth century. The iron works, 

 and the manufacture of arms, form the chief em- 

 ployment of the inhabitants. The fire-aims made 



