106 SUGAR 



producer was charged with his sugar tax in the form of 

 a duty on the weight of the roots. The roots were esti- 

 mated to yield a certain percentage of sugar, and were 

 charged accordingly. This was and was intended to be 

 a strong incentive to the farmers to grow richer roots, 

 and to the factory to get more sugar out of them. The 

 system, as usual in Germany, was a great success. The 

 roots grew richer every year and the machinery for 

 extracting and completing the sugar was constantly 

 improved. Scientific methods progressed and nourished 

 because they brought larger profits to both farmer and 

 manufacturer. In France, on the other hand, the 

 factories were under the strictest excise supervision, 

 every ounce of sugar was checked and noted, and had 

 to pay the full sugar duty. 



The result of these two opposite systems was that 

 while France produced no more in 1884 than she had 

 done in 1871, the German production had gone up from 

 186,000 tons to 1,123,000 tons. The French producers 

 saw that this meant ruin if allowed to continue. The 

 percentage of sugar extracted from the roots had gone 

 up in Germany from 8*28 per cent, to 11 per cent., 

 while in France it remained at the old figure, below 

 6 per cent. The French Government at last realized 

 their mistake and hastened, in 1884, to rectify it by 

 imitating Germany. They adopted the system of duty 

 on the roots, and it was a duty based, of course, on a 

 very low estimate of yield. The effect was instantaneous. 

 Better seed was sown in France, better methods of 

 manufacture were . adopted, the diffusion process was 

 substituted for the old hydraulic presses, and the yield 

 of sugar began to rise by leaps and bounds. From 

 6 per cent, it soon went to 7, 8, 9 and 10 per cent. But 

 as the French producers were allowed the full drawback 

 on exportation, although they were paying only a small 



