THE FARMERS' REGISTER. 



107 



pounds was imported for domestic consumption, 

 ihe whole of which was cane sugar. Thus ol 

 275 millions of pounds of sugar consumed in the 

 United States, about 240 millions are cane su- 

 gar. These facts show thut the quaniiiy of 

 maple sugar manufactured bears a small pro- 

 portion to the vvliole consumpiion, and that this 

 quantity must annually decline wiih the removal 

 of the forests. 



Of beet sugar, 150 millions of pounds are an- 

 nually manulaciured in Europe ; but as cane 

 sugar is cheaper, protecting duties are necessary 

 lor the cultivation of the former. But in ihe 

 Uniied Stales, ihe quantity of beet sugar pro- 

 duced is trifling and probably it will not become 

 a substitute, extensively, for sugar cane. Never- 

 theless, our country does produce a species of 

 sugar which might supersede entirely the con- 

 eumplion of cane sugar, foreign or domestic, and 

 even become an article of exportation. Indian 

 corn contains sugar in large quantities, and 

 might be profitably cultivated lor it in every 

 part of the Union. According to Beaume's 

 saccharometer, or apparatus for ascertaining the 

 quantity of saccharine matter in plants, the 

 corn stalk reaches to 10 degrees of saccharine 

 matter, wliich is three times greater than 

 that of the beet, five times greater than that of 

 the maple tree, and fully equal to the cane in 

 the United States. Experiments prove that six 

 quarts of the juice of corn stalks produce one 

 quart of crystallized syrup, or sugar, which is 

 a product of 16 per cent., while thiriy-lvvo 

 quarts of maple sap will yield only one quart of 

 eyrup. And besides furnishing as great a pro- 

 portion of saccharine matter as the cane, the 

 corn stalk can be produced, (or sugar, within 90 

 days, while the cane requires at least IS months 

 of careful and laborious cultivation to bring it 

 to maturity. 



To produce the greatest quantity of saccha- 

 rine matter in corn stalks, the ear must be pluck- 

 ed so soon as it appears ; and by this process, 

 all the saccharine matter that would have been 

 used in forming the ear, is retained in the stalk. 

 One thousand pounds of sugar may easily be 

 produced from an acre of corn. Those to whom 

 this seems incredible, will remember that a bushel 

 of ripe corn will weight about sixty pounds, and 

 therefore that fifty bushels, an ordinary crop to 

 the acre, will weight three thousand pounds. 

 Then as nearly all the flour or meal of corn is 

 convertible into Etarch, and as starch is convertible 

 into more than its weight of sugar, one thousand 

 pounds of sugar to three thousand pounds of corn 

 is not an extravagant product. To this we may 

 add that in some parts of the country, especially 

 South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, 

 Louisiana and Florida, two crops yearly for sutjar 

 might easily be produced. By the removal of the 

 ear so soon as it appears, this whole quantity of 

 saccharine matter is retained in the stalk, in addi- 

 tion to the quantity which it contains when the 

 corn is allowed to ripen. 



By proper cultivation, we believe that fifteen 

 hundred pounds of sugar might be produced from 

 an acre, in a single crop, and not less than twenty- 

 five hundred pounds in two crops. We must add 

 that while the machinery for manufacturing cane 

 sugar is cumbrous and expensive, that for corn 

 sugar is light and cheap, the etalk requiring only 



one fifth jf the pressure necessary for cane. 

 Besides, cane being an exotic in the United Stales, 

 only a small portion of it yields saccharine 

 matter, while the whole of the corn stalk yielda 

 it, excepting the spindle or top. The stalks, after 

 pressure, with the leaves, are worth enough, it is 

 said, as food for cattle, to defray the expenses of 

 cultivation. 



Though no experiments have been made to 

 test the value of corn stalks for sugar, when 

 dried, we doubt not that they are as valuable lor 

 this purpose, as when green ; (or as nothing but 

 the water evaporates in the process of drying, all 

 the saccharine matter must remain ; and by the 

 process of straining, the stalk may afterwards bo 

 subjected to the press without any loss. This 

 process of drying and subsequent straining is used 

 in the cultivation of beets (or sugar ; and if it can 

 be applied to corn stalks, as we believe, the culti- 

 vation of corn sugar will be greatly facilitated ; 

 (or in that case, the manufacture can be postponed 

 till the winter or end of the autumn, when most 

 other agricultural labors are ended. 



Corn being indigenous in all parts of the union, 

 while the cane is an exotic, and confined to a 

 small southern district, the cultivation of corn 

 sugar may entirely supersede that of the latter. 

 The average crop of sugar in Louisiana is 900 or 

 1000 pounds to the acre, about one third of the 

 product in Cuba and other tropical regions. And 

 besides, the capital necessary (or cane sugar being 

 great, it cannot be cultivated by landholders of 

 moderate means ; and of all modes of southern 

 cultivation, cane sugar has been the least profita- 

 ble. All parts of the United States are subject to 

 frosts, and when they occur in Louisiana, where 

 they are not uncommon, the sugar crop is destroy- 

 ed or injured; and to escape them, the sugar 

 planters are obliged, when the cane is ripe (or 

 cutting, to employ their laborers incessantly dur- 

 ing day and night, in cutting and pressing. But 

 on the sugar lands of the south, two crops of corn 

 for sugar might be produced annuaily, before the 

 appearance of frosts, both yielding 2500 or 3000 

 pounds of sugar. Hence, besides being a profita- 

 ble crop in all other states, corn sugar would be a 

 far more profitable crop than cane sugar in Louisi- 

 ana. We commend this subject to the notice of 

 sugar planters, and advise them to make an ex- 

 periment in the cultivation of corn. Their prepa- 

 rations (or the manufacture are already made in 

 their machinery (or cane sugar, and they would 

 be merely required to raise the corn. In Loui- 

 siana, corn grows not less than twelve feet in 

 height, and like all other plants produced In 

 southern regions, must contain more saccharine 

 matter than northern corn. Hence, if an acre 

 of northern corn would yield, at the rate of fifty 

 bushels of ripe corn to the acre, over one thou- 

 sand pounds of sugar, an acre in Louisiana 

 would yield fifteen hundred or two thousand 

 pounds. Then if it be a profitable crop at the 

 north, much more so will it be in Louisiana and 

 other districts of the union where sugar cane is 

 now cultivated. 



According to Mr. Ellsworth's report, the quan- 

 tity of corn produced in the union, in 1840, was 

 387 millions of bushels ; and if the whole of 

 this had been converted into sugar, at the rate 

 of twenty pounds of sugar to the bushel of sixty 

 pounds of corn, which is a very moderata esti- 



