38 BEET-ROOT SUGAR AND 



according as agricultural machinery is more or less 

 used. The cane in Louisiana is an eight or nine 

 months' crop, and is cut before maturity. 



In the West Indies it is in cultivation, before cutting, 

 for a period of from eleven to fifteen months. The 

 beet grows to maturity in France in from four to five 

 months ; in the United States in from three to four 

 months. In France, with the aid of a horse, one hand 

 will easily "tend" five acres of beets. I know of 

 instances where a hand, with a horse, has clone the 

 whole work on five hectares, or twelve acres, of beets. 



Mr. Child, in 1839, estimated that the whole num- 

 ber of days' labor on an acre of beets would vary from 

 fifteen to nineteen. 



In Illinois, a man, with a pair of horses, tends easily 

 fifty acres of corn, and far more than that amount has 

 been cultivated by one hand. I claim, therefore, that 

 with the improved methods of cultivation now in prac- 

 tice, a man can easily cultivate six acres of beets in 

 four months, and have more than half his time for 

 other labors. The cultivation of six acres of cane 

 would occupy a man exclusively for eight months. 

 The labor, then, upon the acre of cane, is, at least, 

 twice that on an acre of beets. 



It will be shown that the product, per acre, of sugar 

 from beets, is greater than the general average from 

 cane. 



But the advantages in favor of beet culture do not 

 stop here. The cane crop is exhausting ; it is a bad 

 forerunner of other crops ; the ground on which it is 

 cultivated must lie fallow at least half the time ; it 

 feeds and fattens no sheep, cattle, nor swine ; conse- 



