294 NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 



these companies amounted to $80,000,000. At the beginning of 

 the present century the domestic consumption of corn syrup and 

 corn sugar amounted to 1200 million pounds annually. The 

 exports for the decade 1893-1903 amounted to more than 1700 

 million pounds, valued at $28,000,000. 



The report of the committee was one of the most extensive 

 made during the first half century of the Academy and covered 77 

 printed pages. It contained, besides a general introduction, a 

 summary of the history of the starch-sugar industry, an account 

 of the several varieties of glucose and starch-sugar, and of their 

 chemical composition, an inquiry into the healthfulness of 

 glucose as a food, analyses of commercial samples of glucose and 

 starch-sugar with special reference to adulteration, and a list of 

 factories. To this were added fourteen pages of extracts from 

 literature relating to starch-sugar, a bibliography covering 28 

 pages, and a list of patents. 



The results of the work of the committee are summarized in 

 eight paragraphs referring to the following subjects: The his- 

 tory of starch-sugar, the process of manufacture, the extent of 

 the industry, the utilization of the products, the relation of 

 starch-sugar to other sugars, the organic constitutents, the health- 

 fulness of glucose as a food. 



The conclusions were as follows : 



" In conclusion, then, the following facts appear as the result of the present 

 investigation: 1st. That the manufacture of sugar from starch is a long-estab- 

 lished industry, scientifically valuable and commercially important. 2d. That the 

 processes which it employs at the present time are unobjectionable in their char- 

 acter, and leave the product uncontaminated. 3d. That the starch sugar 

 thus made and sent into commerce is of exceptional purity and uniformity of 

 composition, and contains no injurious substances. And, 4th, that though having 

 at best only about three-fifths the sweetening power of cane sugar, yet starch 

 sugar is in no way inferior to cane sugar in healthfulness, there being no evidence 

 before the committee that maize starch sugar, either in its normal condition or 

 fermented, has any deleterious effect upon the system, even when taken in large 

 quantities." 135 



125 Rep. Nat. Acad. Sci. for 1883, p. 88. 



