CANE SUGAR. 



Saturation By this expression is meant any process where water 

 is added to the dry crushed canes, which are then recrushed; a diluted juice 

 containing a proportion of the juice left after the dry crushing is then 

 obtained ; two methods of applying the water may be distinguished ; in one 

 the water is allowed to impinge directly on the megass, and in the other the 

 diluted juice is returned to a bath, through which the megass is drawn. In 

 Mauritius the writer observed that the term * imbilition ' was applied to the 

 former, and 'maceration'' to the latter process; in what follows these terms 

 are adopted. 



The earliest mention of a saturation process is due to Wray ; he describes 

 a plant at work in Province Wellesley in 1848 ; it consisted of a three-roller 

 mill as the dry crusher, followed by a two-roller mill as the recrusher ; the 

 megass was carried from the first mill to the second by a travelling band, on 

 which fell a rain of hot water from an overhead tank ; the surplus water that 

 drained off was sent to the distillery. 



In order to obtain a premium of 100,000 francs, Duchaissing introduced 

 a saturation process into the island of Guadeloupe ; the apparatus was very 

 similar to the one described by Wray ; the two mills were placed eighteen 

 feet apart, and between them ran a travelling band, the underside of which 

 dipped into a tank of hot water while another tank placed above 

 distributed a rain of hot water over the megass. Over the travelling band 

 was arranged a series of beaters. The juice from the two mills could be 

 collected separately, and if the second mill juice was greatly diluted it was 

 returned to the megass from the first mill. 



Kussel and Eisien's scheme introduced into Demerara about the same 

 time was somewhat different ; the mills were placed about thirty feet apart 

 and connected as before by a travelling band. This band ran in a closed 

 chamber of the form of a shoot ; a system of perforated piping ran along the 

 bottom and top of the shoot by means of which water or steam was forced 

 upon the megass ; means were also here provided for treating the first and 

 second mill juice separately. 



Eousselot, who also reduced the cane mill to its present form, patented 

 and introduced into Martinique a system of saturation; his process was 

 essentially one of imbibition. In the Hawaiian Islands saturation was intro- 

 duced by Alexander Young who sold mills on a system of payment by results. 



All these schemes were incepted in the seventies. 



Maceration. In Fig. 129, is shown a train of two mills separated 

 by a macerating bath. Several ways of operating this process are to be met 

 with. With a train of three mills, imbibition may be practised between the 

 second and third mills and the third mill juice may be pumped into the bath 

 between the first and second mills ; in any case the returned juice enters the 

 bath at the end next a later mill and flows in a direction opposite to that in 



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