PREFACE. 



THE OBJECT OF THIS PAMPHLET is to Call public 

 attention to the importance of considering a 

 plausible and practical cause, and not theories 

 long since thrown aside in Europe. We refer to 

 cornstalk and sorghum utilization, and the impractica- 

 bility of their ever supplying the home demand with 

 sugar. 



It would be absurd to suppose that the sugar 

 cane, when to be used for sugar manufacture, can be 

 grown at the North, and it is equally ridiculous to 

 imagine that a sub-variety could be there grown, 

 as experiments have long since proven that the farther 

 north these high breeds are planted the less sugar they 

 contain. This, as one might suppose, would be suffi- 

 cient to condemn the cultivation named ; but, notwith- 

 standing, our Government has spent two years of its 

 time and money upon a series of investigations that 

 have proved absolutely nothing, for the reasons that 

 sugar in no practical amount has ever been produced, 

 and the small quantity obtained was the result of 

 several months' crystallization. This last fact should 

 have been sufficient to condemn further investigations. 

 The greater number of samples selected at Washing- 

 ton were grown under favorable circumstances, and 

 the results obtained should not be compared with 

 those that might have resulted from canes grown by 

 the novice in the Northern and New England States. 

 (What we have just said regarding the sorghum might 

 be repeated in reference to the early amber cane.) 

 In all cases it should be remembered that the sub- 



