No. 5. 



Beet and Corn-Stalk Sugar. — Fall Ploughing. 



143 



from 1837 to 1840. Belgium makes 16 mil- 

 lion pounds — half her consumption of the 

 article. The German Union, 30 millions — a 

 third of its consumption. Austria, the same, 

 but consumes 110 millions of foreign sugar. 

 Chevalier estimates the total consumption of 

 "the most industrious and flourishing coun- 

 tries of Europe" of beet-sugar at 176 millions 

 of pounds, which is not yet a third of the 

 whole. He admits that 20 millions of francs 

 might be the annual gain of the treasury if 

 the beet-sugar manufacture was prohibited 

 in France, but then the measure would re- 

 quire an indemnity of 40 millions to the 

 manufacturers, and throw out of employment 

 a great number of hands. In two of the 

 largest beet-sugar manufactories in France, 

 the problem of making refined beet-sugar 

 from first process has been solved on a large 

 scale ; Mons. Dombasle uses maceration, as 

 the process of extraction ; it simplifies appa- 

 ratus and labour, and neutralizes the cause of 

 waste; he obtains from 95 to 100 of juice 

 instead of 70, and 10 per cent, of sugar easi- 

 ly ; and this process has been adopted in sev- 

 eral other establishments, foreign as well as 

 domestic." 



With regard to Mr. Webb's late experi- 

 ments on Corn-stalks, I coincide with you in 

 the opinion, that the samples of sugar and 

 molasses which were exhibited at the Horti- 

 cultural Society's rooms in Philadelphia, were 

 far superior to any that I have seen made 

 from the beet by first process; his published 

 account of the mode of manufacture is inte- 

 resting, and the comparative yield per cent, 

 of sugar is very great, and not easily to be 

 accounted for; for while he is obtaining one 

 quart of crystallizable liquor from six quarts 

 of expressed juice from the corn-stalk, the 

 Louisiana planters find that their richest juice 

 from the cane yields no more than one in 

 eight, the average being from thirteen to fif- 

 teen, and some as low as thirty or fifty for 

 one. Mr. Webb's communication has found 

 its way into many of the distant papers, and 

 they have generally made it appear, that he 

 has obtained 1000 lbs. of sugar per acre from 

 the corn-stalk, whereas, he only says his opin- 

 ion is that that quantity per acre may be ob- 

 tained by an improved mode of cultivation, 

 &c. ; but I would ask, would even that quan- 

 tity of sugar pay the expense of manufacture 

 and remunerate the loss of the corn-crop 1 I 

 confess that I fear not. You very properly 

 compliment Mr. Webb on his success, and I 

 am willing to award him a medal for his in- 

 genuity and perseverance, but, for what part 

 of the process he conceives he has a right to 

 a patent, I am at a loss to conjecture. If it 

 be upon the simple fact of having obtained 

 sugar from the corn-stalk, hundreds of old 

 people will tell him they accomplished that, 



many years ago, and long before he was born , 

 it being a very common practice in the time 

 of the Revolution ; the manufacturers, how- 

 ever, contenting themselves with the syrup, 

 and not carrying the evaporation to the crys- 

 tallizing point, their object, of procuring mo- 

 lasses, being obtained. Or, is it in the sim- 

 ple operation of extracting the ear in its em- 

 bryo state, by which to concentrate the juices 

 in the stalk and to prevent their dissipation ? 

 Now this has been practised for ages upon 

 the cocoa-tree for the very same purpose, and 

 Mr. Webb no doubt knew if, and has merely 

 adopted the process. We are told — " It is 

 usual to deprive some of those trees of their 

 fruit-buds, in order that they may produce a 

 drink called 'Paviah Arrack;' and it is the 

 employment of some men to collect this arti- 

 cle, which is sold under the name of Toddy." 

 It cannot be for the peculiar process of man- 

 ufacture, for the very simple mode described 

 in Mr. Webb's letter, and the state of the mo- 

 lasses exhibited, prove that the operations 

 must have been of the most inefiective kind, 

 or the molasses would not have held at least 

 50 per cent, of sugar in solution, a convinc- 

 ing fact that the point of concentration had 

 not been either understood or practised, and 

 that the whole process of manufacture had 

 been most ineffectually performed. Now, let 

 it not be supposed that I wish to detract an 

 iota from the credit which is l\Ir. Webb's 

 due; but I wish that he would inform the 

 readers of the Cabinet, what are the specifi- 

 cations upon which he grounds his right to 

 restrict us from doing what has been done for 

 the last age; pointing out what original prin- 

 ciple or new combination is exhibited in his 

 mode of manufacturing sugar from the corn- 

 stalk. J. M. C. 



Eastern Shore, Md., Nov. 10, 3841. 



Fall Ploughing. 



"A farmer of New Jersey, some years 

 since, trench-ploughed an exhausted field of 

 clayey soil in the fall ; cross-ploughed a part 

 of it, and in that part broke the lumps to 

 pieces. In the spring, the field was all plough- 

 ed equally, and sown with barley and clover; 

 the part on which the most labour had been 

 thus bestowed, was in fine order when sown, 

 and yielded 30 bushels an acre of barley — 

 the other part was in lumps, the frosts not 

 being sufficient to mellow them entirely, and 

 the product of barley was only about 20 

 bushels to the acre. The same difference 

 was afterwards observed in the clover." 



Even where envy or bigotry prevents the 

 open declaration of admiration and esteem, 

 these sentiments are always secretly enter- 

 tained towards the truly good man. 



