No. 10. 



Maize or Corn-Sugar. 



809 



tent. It is extremely rich and productive ; but 

 the expense of draining, and keeping up the 

 embankments, must be very considerable ; this 

 forms the first difference to be noted in the 

 culture of the two plants under consideration. 

 The best season for planting cane in Louisi- 

 ana, is in the fall, which is also the time of 

 harvest, when labour is most valuable, and 

 the greatest exertions are required to secure 

 the crop before it is destroyed by frosts But 

 the most striking difference will be found in 

 the cost of seed, and in the labour of planting. 

 The cane is propagated by layers; these are 

 partly furnished from the tops of the plant, 

 when cut for grinding, but are principally 

 rattoons. Of the latter, it requires the pro- 

 duce of one acre to plant three. The grain 

 from one acre of corn will be sufficient for 

 planting forty acres. Therefore the differ- 

 ence in expense for seed, will be as one to 

 thirteen. In planting cane, furrows are made 

 with the plough from two and a half to three 

 feet apart ; in these the layers are placed in 

 a double row, and the earih drawn over them 

 with hoes to the depth of three or four inches. 

 In the spring, before the plants are up, this 

 covering is partly scraped off, so as to leave 

 them buried from one to two inches. 



From this account, it is evident that no 

 more manual labour will be required to drill 

 fifty acres in corn, than to plant one acre in 

 cane. The labour of cultivating the latter 

 plant during its growth, is also greater; but 

 this may be balanced by the extra work re- 

 quired to take off the embryo ears from the 

 corn. When cultivated in the mode recom- 

 mended, the stalk of corn is soft, remarkably 

 heavy, and full of juice from bottom to top. 

 The amount of power required for grinding 

 them, must be much less than is necessary 

 for cane — or, what is the same thing, an equal 

 power will do it with greater rapidity. The 

 average yield of cane in Louisiana, is one 

 thousand pounds of sugar, and forty-five gal- 

 lons of molasses, per acre. From the above 

 comparative statement, it would appear that 

 one half this amount of crop from corn would 

 be equally, if not more profitable. 



I will only add in conclusion, that whether 

 or not sugar from the corn-stalk may soon 

 become an article of profitable export, its 

 manufacture in the simplest form will enable 

 every family to supply themselves with this 

 article for common use, now become so much 

 a necessary of life, and thus save a considera- 

 ble bill of expense, yearly paid for foreign 

 sugars. W. Webb. 



Extract from Annales de la Societe Polytechnique Pra- 

 tique, No. 22, for October, 1839. Translated at the 

 patent office, Washington. 



Sugar of Corn There is no plant of 



greater general interest or utility than Indian 



corn. It can serve, under a great variety of 

 different forms, for the nourishment of man 

 and the domestic animals, and above all, the 

 application of industrious science. 



In reference to its saccharine qualities, 

 maize has not been sufficiently appreciated. 

 Travellers report, that under the tropics the 

 stalk of this plant is so very saccharine, that 

 the Indians suck it as in other places they do 

 the sugar-cane. 



M. Pallas, who has made a great many re- 

 searches on this application of maize, has ar- 

 rived at a remarkable result; he has found by 

 many experiments, both in France, and more 

 recently in Africa, that this vegetable, by a 

 simple modification applied to its culture, is 

 able to furnish a much more considerable 

 quantity of sugar, than by the ordinary me- 

 thod. 



This method consists in detaching from the 

 plant, immediately after the fecundation of 

 the ovaries (after the plant has tasselled) the 

 young ear, and to leave it to develop itself 

 thus deprived of its fruit. Arrived at matu- 

 rity, the stalk of the Indian-corn contains 

 crystallizable sugar in quantity very often 

 double that obtained when the plant is left to 

 mature with the grain. In fact, by the ordi- 

 nary mode of culture, the grain is nourished 

 at the expense of the sugar in the stalk, as it 

 absorbs a great quantity of this immediate 

 principle, which, by the process of nutrition, 

 is converted into starch. On the other hand, 

 if the young ears are immediately destroyed, 

 the sugar intended to nourish them remains 

 in them where it accumulates, and the maize 

 plant is thus converted into a true sugar-cane, 

 while the fibrous part can be manufactured 

 into paper. 



The quantity of sugar is so very great in 

 the stalk of the maize deprived of the ear, 

 that the pith of this vegetable retains a sensi- 

 ble flavour of sugar even after it has been 

 dried, as is easily proved by examining the 

 specimens deposited by M. Pallas in the Bu- 

 reau of the Academy of Sciences. These 

 results are so important as to merit experi- 

 ments on a grander scale, which may obtain 

 thus for France a source of new industry in 

 the manufacture of sugar. 



Mildew on Gooseberries. — " To keep 

 off mildew, train your bushes so as to admit 

 a free circulation of air through them ; ma- 

 nure about the roots, and forget not to sprin- 

 kle them freely with soap-suds before blos- 

 soming. This is known by several years' 

 experience." 



A THOROUGH-SHAPED bcast wiU always 

 come well to the scale, whereas an ill-formed 

 one will seldom reach the weight at which 

 he is estimated. 



