464 AGRICULTURAL MANUFACTURES. 
The interruption of the trade with those colonies which still re- 
mained to France, and which they soon after lost by the conquest 
of the British, induced the French directory, and afterwards the 
Imperial Government, to push forward the manufacture as much as 
possible. The price of sugar, indeed, on the Continent, was of 
itself a sufficient inducement. The issuing of the Berlin and Milan 
Decrees by Napoleon, by which all intercourse with England 
was as Strictly interdicted as so extended a seaboard would admit 
of, raised the price of raw sugar to five francs (4s. 2d.) per kilo- 
gramme, or about 2s. per pound. On the other hand, by the aid 
of science, not only was the quality greatly improved by the em- 
ployment of chemical agents in its purification, but the product was 
increased from 32 to 4, 5, 6, and eventually 7 per cent. 
The existence of saccharine matter is not confined, amongst our do- 
mestic and other plants, to the beetroot. It is found in them all to a 
greater or less proportion, but greatest in that of the Silesian beet 
-and its varieties. All the mangold-wurzel tribes possess it, but 
only the Silesian and its varieties in sufficient quantity to render 
its manufacture profitable. The Chinese sugar-cane, or sorgho, 
has, however, been recently introduced, and is now extensively 
cultivated in the south of France for the same purpose, and is 
found to yield a full proportion of sugar, below a certain latitude. 
It is a remarkable provision of nature, that, taking the latitude of 
45° as the line of demarcation, the quantity of saccharine in bul- 
bous plants rises as you advance towards the north, and decreases 
towards the south; and that, on the other hand, the gramineous 
plants, such as the cane, maize, sorgho, &c., increase their saccha- 
rine properties as they advance towards the south, and lose it 
towards the north. In the neighbourhood of Marseilles, for in- 
stance, the sorgho is found to yield fully 7 or 8 per cent. of sugar, 
whilst in the neighbourhood and latitude of Paris it does not con- 
tain more than 4 or 5 per cent. On the other hand, no beet sugar 
factories are to be found on the Continent below 45°. 
It is proper to state here, that there are in commerce two descrip- 
tions of sugar, possessing different characteristics, and requiring 
different processes in their production. , The first and best of these 
is extracted in its perfect state, by mechanical means alone, from 
the cane and its varieties, the beetroot, and the maple. This sugar 
erystallises after condensation by boiling, and is identically the 
same in these three substances in properties and composition when 
similarly manutactured. That trom beetroot, however, is said by. 
