84 



The World's Commercial Products 



INTERIOR OF AUSTRALIAN JAM FACTORY — BOILING PANS 



habit of the plant is distinctl' 

 grass-like, and we find 

 group of stems of equal siz 

 springing from the ground i] 

 a clump, each bearing long 

 grass-like leaves, and ter 

 minating in the flowerinj 

 season in a feathery plum 

 somewhat like the more fa 

 miliar Pampas Grass. Th 

 stems are commonly as thicl 

 as bamboos, such as couL 

 be used for curtain poles o 

 the legs of a small table, bu 

 instead of being hard an< 

 woody outside and hollo\ 

 within, they have a tougl 

 rind and are solid, with fibrous strands running through the soft sugar-containing tissue. 



The sweet juice of the sugar-cane stem was appreciated in very early times, and the prepa 

 ration of solid sugar from it was practised long before the Christian Era. History records tha 

 Alexander the Great feasted on " solid honey not made by bees." The Greek physician 

 appear to have known sugar under the name of " Indian salt." 



The native country of the plant is not known with certainty, but in all probability it wa 

 in the region of Cochin China, India, or Malaya. Thence it spread to Africa and later fc 

 America. These wanderings having taken place during the historical period can be trace* 

 with some approach to certainty. 



The sugar-cane was early cultivated in Egypt, Sicily, and Spain, to which countries it wa 

 introduced by the Arabs. From Sicily it was introduced into Madeira, and thence to th 

 Canaries about 1425 a.d. by Don Henry of Portugal. Soon after the discovery of Americ; 

 the sugar-cane was introduced into the tropical part of the New World, reaching Hayti an< 

 Brazil early in the sixteenth century, and spreading thence to Mexico, Guadeloupe, Martinique 

 and later to Bourbon. In Hayti, as recorded by Porter in his work on the sugar-cane, th 

 cultivation proved so successful and extended with such rapidity that the cost of the magni 

 ficent palaces of Madrid and Toledo is stated to have been defrayed by the proceeds of th 

 port duties on the sugar imported from the island. The sugar-cane reached Barbados fron 

 Brazil in 1641, and was distributed thence to other West Indian islands. 



The cultivation of the sugar-cane is only profitable in the tropics and in some sub-tropica 

 countries. It is characteristically a tropical plant in its requirements, thriving best under ai 

 average temperature of about 80° F. and a rainfall of at least 60 inches per annum, or ai 

 equivalent artificial supply of water. As indicating the range of climates in which the sugar 

 cane will live, even if not at its best, we may mention that it is grown on a commercial scale ii 

 the south of Spain, in Japan, and it will grow in Cape Colony and New Zealand. In sub-tropica 

 countries such as Louisiana and Natal it does fairly well so long as the conditions are favourable 

 but the sugar-cane is at its best in such lands as India, Cuba, Java, British Guiana, Hawaii- 

 all thoroughly tropical regions. Cuba and Java together produce about one-half of th< 

 commercial cane-sugar supply of the world, each exporting at present over 1,000,000 tons pe: 

 annum. 



Cultivation 



■ The details of sugar-cane cultivation differ in various countries according to local condi 



tions. In British Guiana, the Straits Settlements, Hawaii, and Egypt, irrigation is practisec 



to a greater or less extent. In countries where land is plentiful, virgin soil is cleared and planted 



