THE ILLINOIS F^Il]MEIl. 



195 



Mr. Morrill's land bill, which is to make 

 agricultural colleges and schools in all the 

 States, I hope will become a law. What 

 would I now give if I had been able to spend 

 two years of my youth in an agricultural 

 school ! Speed the day for the passage of 

 Morrill's land bill. ^ 



"Fall Planting Trees." — If this can be done 

 in November, well; if the ground is open and 

 they can be planted in December, well. 

 Everything depends on the planting, on the 

 character of the ground, and favorable weath- 

 er. 



<<Hogs." — These pay well and would pay 

 much better if corn was cheaper. This year 

 farmers will make more money on hogs than 

 packers. 



"Chinese Sugar Cane Seed" can be plant- 

 ed in the fall — a fact of importance, if such 

 planting will secure the early maturity of 

 the plant the next season. 



Rhubarb roots should be planted out in the 

 fall or early in the spring. You can't make 

 the ground too rich for them. 



"Homo" thinks the steam plow will ulti- 

 mately be a success, but that it may operate 

 against the welfare of small farmers. That 

 same doctrine was preached when steamboats 

 were invented, and railroads first came into 

 being, — when sewing machines were set in 

 operation, and spinning machines were put to 

 work doing more spinning than fifty hands. 

 Never fear. When machinery does work 

 cheap, it is better for everybody. Such, at 

 least, says experience. 



Mr. Verry Aldrich, a distinguished fruit- 

 grower of Bureau county, says that, "Barrens 

 that are high and a little rolling are best for 

 an orchard." Here is a fact to the man who 

 is about to plant an orchard ten times the 

 worth of the cost of subscription for this pa- 

 per. 



"The Physical Training of Girls," is a 

 good article. They should be well clad, have 

 a good deal of out-door exercise, ride, and 

 walk and run, if they will. The plan of 

 bringing them up as hot house plants is en- 

 feebling our race. 



"Tree Pedling" has a capital notice. Tree 

 pedling merchants should be under the same 

 rules as travelling merchants, who carry about 

 their locomotive dry goods stores. Compel 

 them to take out licenses and give security for 

 performance of contracts, — when they 

 sell trees for particular kinds, they make con- 

 tracts, — and means should be provided to en- 

 force them for ten years after made. 



The lovers of flowers will thank the writer 

 for the notice of the Chrysanthemum. These 

 are all beautiful, and they come into flower 

 in the "most melancholy month of the year." 

 On the. whole, Mr. Editor, your December 

 number of the Farmer is an interesting one. 

 I would be glad to see such papere go into 

 the hands of every farmer in the State. 

 They would do good. H0310. 



Raspberries. — Have jou protected 

 your raspberries? If not, do it now. 

 Bend them down and throw litter or 

 straw over them, — enough to keep them 

 down. 



Small grape vines do well protected 

 in the same way. 



Delavax, Dec. 7, 1858. 

 Editor Illinois Farmer : — Yours of Nov. 

 23d has been received, expressing yonr sur- 

 prise at my success in granulating the Imphee 

 juice when Gov. Hammond could not do it. 

 It seems, almost, as though your remarks 

 savored of distrust in my statements, although 

 I hardly think that you, or any one else ac- 

 quainted, would feel thus, though I do not 

 wish to boast. You request me to send my 

 process, which [ will, and desire to do so for 

 publication, hoping it may be of some use to 

 my brother farmers; — but, however, that I 

 am an adept in manufacturing cane juice. I 

 think that in writing for agricultural papers, 

 we often presume too much upon the gene- 

 ral information of many, if not of most of our 

 farmers, on this subject. Perhaps you will 

 agree with me upon this point, if I state a few 

 facts that transpired the present fall in this 



region. 



One man near — 

 tie sucrar cane and 



Grove, raised a lit- 



tried to make molasses 

 and burnt it all up, and now has a bad opin- 

 ion of the business. Another raised some 

 cane and got the liberty to make it up at the 



works of C , where they had three boilers. 



In the afternoon he came to the house in 

 great trouble, and said to the lady that he 

 had burnt up all his molasses, and feared he 



had spoiled the boiler. Mr. S , living 



five miles from me, informed me tliat a neigh- 

 bor of his, an honest, good man, came to his 

 house for three quarts of lime to put into 

 cane juice, and said, he had a ichoh barrel of 

 juice. He took the lime home and put it all 

 in and boiled it down to molasses, and was 

 greatly disappointed that he could not eat it. 

 lie said he had boiled it down very carefully 

 and was sure he did not burn it I could 

 make other statements about equal to the 

 above, but will not. I shall now be some- 

 what particular in regard to my manufactu- 

 ring of sugar : 



1st. To make milk of lime, put, say, a lump | 

 of unslacked lime as large as two fists, into a 

 vessel and pour on a gallon of hot water. It 

 will directly boil and the lime slack to pieces 

 and become white as milk. Always stir it up 

 well when you go to use it. Lime water is 

 made in the same way, but must s:; nd to 

 settle perfectly clear as water, and not be 

 stirred up when used, but poured off in its 

 pure state. 



2nd. I boil my juice in square tubs, made 

 made of J inch plank, with sheet iron of the 

 best quality nailed on with two rows of six 

 penny nails. These tuba are set on arches. 

 I grind cane with wooden rollers, turned by 

 one horse. I have to use wood, not of the 

 best quality, and begasse, (ground cane 

 dried.) Now, I am ready to proceed with my 

 process. 



I ground one patch of Imphee, selecting 

 only the ripe canes, running them through 

 the mill twice. I obtained about 24 gallons 

 of juice. In the first part of my process I 

 followed Dr. Jackson's method. 



1st. I neutralized the j nice with milk of 

 lime till litmus paper dipped into it would 

 remain blue. This took a little less than a 

 table-spoonful before the frost, and a little 

 more than a table-spoonful after the frost. I 

 then, not having eggs nor blood, used milk 

 in my first batch, which is not near as good 

 blood. Afterwards I used eggs, 



as 



eggs or 



and will describe the whole process as it ap- 

 peared under their use. I beat up well the 

 whites of eight eggs for every tub full of 12 

 gallons; mix the beaten eggs with one gal- 

 lon of cold juice and pour it into the boiler, 

 then pour in the whole tub-full of remaining 

 juice, which will mix all well together. 

 Bring to a boil as speedily as possible, but be 

 sure it doe" not boil one-half minute till the 

 boiler be removed or the fire extinguished, so 

 that the boiling ceases. The scum will then 

 have a thick, green, beautiful appearance, 

 and a minute or two, or three, before it boils, 

 white spots will begin to break out all over 

 the surface. When it begins to boil under- 

 neath, there will be a motion of the scum on 

 top, like the heaving about of the earth under 

 the influence of an earthquake. I am thus 

 particular, because if you let it boil two or 

 three minutes, half the scum will boil in again, 

 and your labor more than half lost. Stop at 

 the right time then, and after waiting fifteen 

 or twenty minutes, remove the scum — then 

 strain the juice through a blanket or some 

 other cloth into the boilers in which you in- 

 tend to evaporate, and boil down as fast as 

 possible to one-half, or to 15° Baume's saeh- 

 arometer. I, however, guess at it. At this 

 point, Mr. Lovering's course is to extinguish 

 the fire, let the syrup cool to 1G0° Fahren- 

 heit, then add more eggs, then raise to a 

 boil, then extinguish the fire again ; wait 

 fifteen or twenty minutes, and remove the 

 scum ; then lade into a bone-black leach ; 

 then, after it has pa.s.sed the leach, return to 

 the boiler; then add one gill of pure lime- 

 water for every ten gallons of juice, &c. 

 But, as I had not bone-black suificient to 

 make a leach, I pursued my own course a.s 

 best I could, and used what information I 

 possessed. After clarifying my whole batch 

 of twenty-four galh)ns, and reducing it about 

 half, I put in a gill, or some more, perhaps, 

 of lime-water, without stopping the boiling. 

 Soon after this I also added one ounce of 

 granulated bone-black for every gallon of 

 juice. When this is thrown into the boiling 

 >syrup, you will observe it everjwhere turn- 

 iu£j white, or whitish, and hear a hissins: 

 sound. 



I then continued to boll down very care- 

 fully till large, bright bubbles appeared all 

 over the surface of the syrup. It is now 

 approaching the sugary state, and must be 

 treated with a very slow fire, and less and less 

 fire till finished. My rule was to remove 

 the fire when one little piece of begasse in a 

 blaze would raise the syrup into a foam. My 

 course was at this junctuae, to stop the fire, 

 shovel out all the bone-black I could, and 

 then lade the syrup into some vessel and 

 leave it till pretty cool, and then drain it off 

 to get rid of the remaining bone-black. 

 When nearly cool and you go to drain it off, 

 you will find, a not very thick, but beautiful 

 scum, having much the appearance of yellow 

 buffed buck-skin. 



I have found granulation taking place, or 

 beginning, at various periods from 24 hours 

 to two weeks after the boiling. 



A few general remarks and I have done. 

 In my first trial I tried to bring the boiling 

 syrup up to Lovering's 238° and came near 

 burning it up. When taken off and cooled, 

 it resembled candy, at a molasses candy pull- 

 I thought I had made a failure, but y(.j. 



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