REFINING BEET SUGAR. 337 



When this sugar, which I call molasses sugar, to distin- 

 guish it from the brown sugar of the first boiling, is to be 

 refined, the molasses which lies upon the top is dipped 

 out, and the rest is made to flow out through small gimlet 

 holes bored in the bottom and around the circumference 

 of the cask. 



The sugar, when deprived of all the molasses which can 

 be made to flow from it, still forms only an adhesive paste, 

 which can scarcely be refined ; I therefore put this paste 

 into bags of coarse, strong cloth, and subject it to a strong 

 compression. The sugar thus freed from molasses is very 

 dark colored, but the quality of it is excellent, and it is as 

 easily refined as the best brown sugar. 



When the brown sugar boilings turn badly^ and crystal- 

 lization in the moulds is imperfect, and, in a word, at all 

 times when sugar is ropy, and parts but imperfectly with its 

 molasses, it is necessary to subject it to the action of the 

 press before attempting to refine it ; as soon as it has in 

 Ihis way been freed from all its molasses, it may be refined 

 without any difficulty.* 



SECTION III. 



On the Refining of Sugar obtained prom Beet Roots, 



When the sugar is dry, the refining of it is easily per- 

 formed ; all possible pains then should be taken in the pre- 

 ceding operations to free it from all its molasses. 



All the operations of refining may be brought under two 

 heads, clarification in the boiler, and whitening in the 

 moulds. 



To refine sugar well, it is better not to operate upon too 



* In most of the beet sugar manufactories they have adopted the 

 swinging boilers for preparing their sirups ; concentration is per- 

 formed speedily in these, and they hare the advantage of being emp' 

 tied in a moment ; but they are usefiil only when the operation it 

 performed upon dry sugars, like the American, which contain but Jit- 

 tie molasses. Our beet sugar is never so well drained as the imported 

 sugars are, and requires much more care in the boiling. These boil- 

 ers appear to me more apt to cause the burning of the sugar than th« 

 old kind, and I therefore give the preference to the latter. 

 29 



