EXPERIMENTS WITH SORGHUM CANES. 

 By Magnus Swenson. 

 The chief object of the experiments conducted during the past 

 season has been to demonstrate the practicability of making 

 sugar from cane grown in this state. For this reason the work 

 has been carried on in a thoroughly practical manner. My re- 

 sults are not based on theory ; they do not show what might be- 

 obtained, but what has actually been done. The amount of 

 sugar obtained is not deduced from the amount present in the 

 cane or syrup, but represents what has actually been crystallized 

 and separated as sugar. 



MACHINERY. # 



The apparatus used consisted of one horizontal mill, made by 

 the Madison Manufacturing Company ; one ten horse-power steam 

 boiler ; one defecator of galvanized sheet iron, 3 feet high, 2.5 

 feet in diameter, and heated by a steam coil, made of 1-inch gas 

 pipe ; two galvanized iron evaporating pans, the larger 6 feet 

 long, 3 feet wide, 1 foot deep ; the smaller 4 feet long, 2 feet wide, 

 8 inches deep, both heated by steam coils ; one globular vacuum 

 pan 30 inches in diameter ; one wet air pump for exhausting the 

 vacuum pan ; one centrifugal machine for separating the sugar 

 from the syrup, 1^ feet in diameter, and 4 inches deep ; one small 

 steam pump for feeding the boiler, and running the vacuum pan 

 and centrifugal machine. 



CANE SUGAR AND GLUCOSE. 



Before passing on to the actual experiments, a few pages will 

 be devoted to the general properties of cane sugar, and the sub- 

 stances occurring with it in the cane juice. The average cane 

 contains about 85 per cent, of juice and 15 per cent, of dry 

 bagasse. The juice from the average cane obtained on the farm 

 consisted of 9.5 per cent, cane sugar, 3.2 per cent, glucose, 2.3 

 per cent, organic acid and vegetable matter, and 8.5 per cent, 

 water. Cane sugar is a compound substance composed of 12 parts 

 carbon, 22 parts hydrogen, 11 parts oxygen; or since 1 part 



