1S39] 



F A R M E il S ' REGISTER. 



sal 



0(1 in such abuiulnnce ns lliey have been here. 

 Anient spirils were Tinkncnvn, exxept ns a medi- 

 cine m iho (lrufXi2;if=t'^ shop, until the cane siignr 

 ami tnolaspes makers of the WckSI Indies brouirhl 

 rum into the w-orid. The taste once Ibrmed, de- 

 mand anise lur brandy, perry, gin and whiskey. 

 Anderston, in iiis 'Origin of Commeice,' re- 

 marks: ''The consumption of rum in New Eng- 

 land is so great, ihat an author nn this subject as- 

 scris, that there has been 20,000 hhds. ol' French 

 molasses mannfactiucd into rum at Boston in one 

 ye'ir, so vast is the demand for that liquor." Sir j 

 William Douglass, in a work printed at Boston, { 

 in 1755, tells us, tliat -'spirits, (spiritus ardentes,) 

 not above a century ago, were used only as ofii- 

 cinal cordials, but now are become an endemical 

 plague, being a pernicious ingredient in most ofour 

 beverages." 



The duly of two cents on brown sugar, in the' 

 United States, was originally laid for revenue, 

 though it must be considered high for- that pur- 

 pose ; being nearly filiy per cent, on tlie cost. At 

 the time ol" the purchase of Louisiana, it was ad- 

 vanced to two and a half cents, propably for pro- 

 tection. During the la^^t war wilii great Britain, 

 it was doubled, bemg then five cents. At the 

 peace it was fixed at three cents, avowdedly for 

 protection. In 1832, it was brouirht back to the 

 rate of two and a half cents : and this is main- 

 tained lor the encouragement of thesuirnr planters 

 of Louisiana, Florida, Arkansas, Mississippi, Ala- 

 bama and Ceorgia. The article is aflord^d in the 

 New Orleans market, and on the Louisiana plan- 

 tations, ai five to six cents a pound. The planters 

 liave repeatedly declared, that, at less prices, the 

 bu-iiiess cannot be sustained. The cost of pro- 

 duction, when this industry was most flourishing, 

 was two and a iialf to three and a half cents, ex- 

 clusive of the interest on the investment. 



We have now surveyed the field of competi- 

 tion in which the beet sugar business must take 

 root, il' that be its dosijny in this country. I*- i-^ 

 certain, that the high hopes conceived of it have 

 sutfered considerable abatement from experiments 

 made, and views put Ibrlh, in Great Britain. 

 These it is our duty to weigh, and to determine 

 how far they ought to influence the resolutions of 

 North American cultivators and capitalists. But 

 it is necessary that we should first examine, with 

 some minuteness, the history and present condi- 

 tion of beet sugar industry. 



It is now nearly a hundred years since Mar- 

 gralf, a Prussian chemist, residing at Berlin, made 

 tlie discovery that \\\:'. beet contained a good crys- 

 tallizable sugar. His attention was first drawn to 

 this subject by the saccharine taste of the beet, 

 and the crystalline appearance of its flesh, when 

 exanfmed with a microscope. Having cut the 

 beet into thin slices, he dried perfectly, and theti 

 pulverized them. To eight ounces of the powder 

 he added twelve of highly rectified spirits of wine, 

 and exposed the mixture to a gentle heat in a sand 

 bath. As soon as the liquid reached the boiling 

 point, he removed it from the fire, and filtered it 

 into a flask, which he coiked up and left to itself 

 In a lew weeks he perceived that crystals were 

 lormed, which exhibited all the physical and che- 

 mical |)roperties of the sugar cane's. The alcohol 

 still contained sugar in solution, and a resinous 

 matter, which he disengaged by evaporation. 

 Having submitted several other vegetable sub- 

 VoL. V11-G6 



stances (a-s parsnips, skerret, and dried grapes) to 

 the same treatment, he obtained sugar Irom each. 

 In 1741, he addressed to the Academy ol Berlin 

 a memoir, entitled 'Chen)ical Experiments, made 

 with a view to extract genuine sugar from seve- 

 ral Plants which grow in these countries.' 



Margrufl'solved the important problem, that ge- 

 nuine sugar was not confined to the cane. After 

 this, he enlarged and varied his experiments, but 

 did not invent means of making sugar from the 

 new material on a scale sutTiciently large to ren- 

 der it an object. ol interest to capitalists. Yet he 

 seiMns to have had a prescience, that his discovery 

 would one day assume importance. He com- 

 mended it to the attention of the Prussian cultiva- 

 tors, and particularly the small farmers, as offering 

 a new and beneficial branch of agriculture. 



Margrall died in 1782. He was a member of 

 the Academy of Berlm, Director of the Class of 

 Natural Philosophy, and Fellow of the Academy 

 of Sciences at Paris. His works were collected 

 and published in two volumes, octavo, in French, 

 1767. A German translation was published at 

 Leipsic, the liDllowing year. 



It was Achard, also a chemist of Berlin, who 

 discovered the method of extracting the sugar from 

 the beet on a large scale, and at a moderate ex- 

 pense. He first announced this result in 1797. 

 In 1799, a letter from him was inserted in the 

 y/iinales de Chimie. in which he detailed his me- 

 thod. He there states the cost at 4'^ cts., the 

 pound of Silesia,— or about 6 cents the pound 

 avoirdupois, — without counting the benefit to be 

 derived from the residuums. He also expressed 

 the opinion, that, with these included, and with 

 some improvements in the processes, this sugar 

 might be produced at half that price. This an- 

 nouncement caused a great sensation in France. 

 It engrossed the attention of the Parisian world ; 

 elicilinir, alternately, ridicule and admiration. The 

 high price to which sugar had risen in France, in 

 consequence of the ca[)ture of nearly all her colo- 

 nial possessions, gave something more than a 

 speculative interest to the ideas oi' Achard. The 

 Naiional Institute appointed a commission to ex- 

 amine the subject. The result of their investiga- 

 tion was, that the cost of raw sugar of the beei 

 would be 16 cents per pound. The price of sugar 

 v/as such, that even at that rate a very large profit 

 might have been cleared ; but this consideration 

 was not sufficient to induce many persons to take 

 the risk of a peace with England, supposed at that 

 time to be approaching. Only two establishments 

 were Rirmed ; one at St. Ouen, and the other at 

 Chelles, in the environs of Paris. Both of them 

 were failures ; partly from the bad quality of their 

 beets, and partly from the ignorance and inexpe- 

 rience of the conductors and workmen. With 

 them went down the high hopes, which had ari- 

 sen, of this new branch of industry in France. 



It is difficult to say, whether these hopes would 

 ever have been resuscitated, if political events of 

 an overruling nature had not supervened. By the 

 Berlin and Milan decrees, all colonial articles 

 were prohibited, and that Ihmous "continental sys- 

 tem," so wide and wild in its design, but so impor- 

 taiu and permanent in its etlects, was established. 

 From that time, 1906, cheniisis and economists 

 applied themselves with renewed zeal to the search 

 after an indigenous source for the supply of sugar. 

 It was thought, at one limoj that the desideratum 



