468 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



A Member. What is the cause of some of the juice having so much gum, even 

 among the water swung out in the centrifugal ? 



Prof. Wiley. This is one of the peculiarities I spoke of awhile ago. I can not 

 tell. This gum that comes in sorghum is identical with the sugar-cane of the 

 South, but is different in property. 



Dr. A. Furnas. What would a shredder cost for one of our factories, with a ca- 

 pacit}' of 150 gallons of syrup per day? 



Prof. Wiley. I do not know what they would cost, but they will not be costly. 

 They make them now as low as one-horse power. 



Mr. Salerthivait. The doctor spoke of rapid evaporation after defecation. This 

 season I had a small tank that would hold a hundred gallons of juice. I heated 

 the juice about milk-warm, and then applied the lime, and beat it ready for skim- 

 ming. After removing the first scum another coat would raise, and sometimes as 

 high as four; then I would draw into the settling-tank. As soon as leaving the 

 settling-tank it went into evaporator, and was evaporated rapidly. I used no sul- 

 phur fumes. Would it be better to run into fast evajjoration without defecation ? 



Prof. Wiley. No sir ; make defecation always. The boiling makes the color. 



Mr. Satertkwait. Suppose you have thirty minutes to stop and let it cool down; 

 would it make it too dark? When we clean out the tank you would be surprised. 

 Some of my people got hold of some Orleans molasses ; a good portion of it went to 

 sugar, and it was good quality. They got me to work it over with my fire-pan, but 

 I found I had something better than my fire-pan; I put my steam pipe righi into 

 the barrel and boiled it about three minutes and drew it off. I worked this in 

 batches; I like a continual flow best. If you get your juice regulated and an even 

 body of steam, you have nothing to do but to pass around and take the scum off. 



Query No. 1 : Will the skimmings of the pan be detrimental to hogs from the 

 large amount of lime used? 



W. L. Anderson. I use bisulphate of lime and lime both. I do not believe it 

 is deleterious, but advantageous, as starch has much to do in furnisliing fattening 

 qualities. The starch is in the scum, and the hogs get that which is valuable to 

 them. 



W. F. Lieizman. I have used lime for a number of years, and for the last two 

 years bisulphate, and have had no bad results. My hogs fatten faster when we 

 make molasses than any other time. My opinion is that skimmings are not injuri- 

 ous. 



'Dr. Furnas. We don't have enough hogs to feed it to. One of my neighbors 

 comes and gets it for his hogs, and thinks it is very beneficial. 



Query No. 2: Does bisulphate of lime injure the manufacture of cake? Or, 

 in other words, what does bisulphate have to do with soda? 



W. L. Anderson. There are persons in my settlement who buy sorghum because 

 it makes better cake. I have never heard an objection of that kind. 



The convention adjourned until 7 o'clock. 



