302 Miscellaneous Intelligence. 
are themselves full of sugar dissolved in water, and this solution can be 
kept for a long time in them, without undergoing any alteration at all, 
that if the same conditions which exist in nature could only be obtained 
in — there is no reason why an artificial solution of sugar may 
e kept unaltered for a considerable space of time; or in other 
eee why water should not be used for the purpose of iene the 
sugar out of the crude juice expressed from the cane. 
The difficulties, indeed, are not owing to the sugar or to the water, 
but to the air, and the a produced by its action on the crude sap 
of the sugar-cane. The object of M. Melsens was then, to exclude the 
air — the sap when mare from the cane, and to prevent the forma- 
tion of any a = might change the character of the saccha- 
rine matter. This he has succeeded in doing by availing himself of: 
the well-known affinity of sulphurous acid for oxygen gas. Sulphurous 
acid, however, alone was found not to answer the purpose ; the sulphu- 
tic acid, produced by the absorption of oxygen by sulphurous acid, 
acting on the sugar, converts it into grape-sugar. This difficulty has 
been overcome by using sulphurous acid combined with a powerful 
base, which, as the sulphurous acid is converted into sulphuric wees 
combines with the latter and forms an insoluble salt. 
The acid sulphites, and more especially the hisulphite of lime, were 
tas a by M. Melsens for the double purpose of preventing ferment- 
ation by the action of the sulphurous acid, and of neutralizing the sul- 
phuric acid as fast as it formed by mean s of the lime. 
Sugar-candy dissolved in cold water containing bisulphite of lime, 
even in excess, a entirely, and without undergoing any change, 
by spontaneo us evaporation, at a low temperature. Several other exper- 
iments of the same suniine but differing in their details, always gave the 
same result; in each the sugar crystallized out by spontaneous evapo- 
ri sat any loss either i in quantity or in quality, and without any 
appea of molasses. In these ce i the sugar dissolved in 
wane pohiealabecs bisul phite of lime in excess, was boiled, and then left 
to evaporate, sometimes afier being filtered, veenilinden without any fil- 
- 
FS] 
=, 
5 
From the experiments which M. Melsens has made with bisulphite of 
lime, it is probable that if a cold solution of this salt were to be poured 
on the sugar-cane grinder, so as to mix with the ae the moment 
it is expressed from the cane, the sugar might be kept for some time 
might be exposed to the heat necessary for its clarification without any 
eye loss or dubeticnatiots 
Bisulphite of lime, moreover, —_ y and tolerab! y —— bleach- 
es the colored substances found in the su ugar-cane ; il p the for- 
mation of other colored matters ‘alia ed by the action vee air aie ashe pulp 
of the cane; it also stops the production of those which are for 
