ROUND AND ABOUT A SUGAR REFINERY 87 



looking girls, garbed in scrupulously clean cotton 

 uniform. The cubes are put up in cardboard boxes, 

 which hold specified quantities varying from 1 pound 

 to 14 pounds, or in tins if they are going to the tropics ; 

 and these smaller packages are subsequently fitted 

 in layers within wooden boxes. Or the cubes are 

 packed straight away into hundredweight cases. 



But this Refinery's enormous output of sugar does 

 not all leave the works in the form of cubes. Castor, 

 white crystallized, granulated, moist and preserving 

 sugars are all produced here ; indeed, every variety 

 of refined white sugar is made. Some of the cook- 

 ing sugars consist of broken cubes and the sugar- 

 dust that falls from the slabs during the cutting 

 process. But most of the " loose " varieties are 

 specially treated onwards from the vacuum pan stage. 

 The masse-cuite is only run into moulds for the pro- 

 duction of cube sugar ; with other ends in view it 

 is centrifugalled in the free state, and the separated 

 sugar crystals are specially treated according to the 

 kind of sugar that is required. For instance, they are 

 " granulated " in revolving cylinders ; herein they are 

 tossed about, and brought into contact with a current 

 of hot filtered air, with the result that they become 

 dry and crisp. They are then passed over sieves to 

 free them from " dust." 



Inferior grade sugars are made from the syrup 

 driven off from the superior qualities. And the 

 syrup from which all the crystallizable sugar has been 

 extracted is called molasses, and is turned to profitable 

 account ; it is mixed with a very absorbent variety 

 of moss in the manufacture of Moleissine Meal, a 

 popular cattle food. 



