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are able to follow the fruit completely through this stage of its 
treatment. With vessels of such great size and weight, holding at 
least half a ton of fruit and pulp, it is clearly easier to deal with 
the syrup than the fruit. To take the fruit out of one solution and 
to place it in the next stronger, and so on throughout the series, 
would be a toilsome process, and one, moreover, injurious to the 
fruit. In each of these jars, therefore, is fixed a wooden well, into 
which a simple hand-suction pump being introduced, the syrup is 
pumped from each jar daily into the adjoining one. 
“¢ How is the relative strength in each jar regulated?’ is the 
next question. ‘The fruit itself does that,’ is the foreman’s reply; 
and this becomes clear from the following explanation: Number 
your jars from 1 to 8 respectively; and assume No. 1 to be 
that which has just been filled with peel brought straight from 
the boiler, in which it has been deprived of the last trace of salt, 
and No. 8 to contain that which, having passed through every stage 
of absorption but the last, is now steeped in the freshly-prepared 
and therefore the strongest solution of syrup used in this stage. 
‘We prepare daily a syrup of the strength of 30deg., measured by 
the “provino,” a graduated test for measuring the density of the 
syrup,’ continued the foreman; ‘and that is poured upon the fruit 
in jar No. 8. To-morrow the syrup from this jar, weakened by the 
absorption from it by the fruit of a certain proportion of sugar, 
will be pumped into jar No. 7, and so on daily through the series. 
Thus, No. 1, containing the fruit itself, regulates the strength of 
the syrup, as I said” ‘But if the syrup has lost all its strength 
before the seventh day, on arrival at No. 1” we ask. ‘Care must 
be taken to prevent that, by constant testing by the “provino,”’ 
is the reply, ‘and, if that is found to be the case, a little stronger 
syrup must be added to the jar.’ 
“A slight fermentation next takes place in most of the jars; 
but this, so far from being harmful, is regarded as necessary. Of 
course, it must not be allowed to go too far. There is yet another 
stage, and that, perhaps, the most important through which the 
peel has to pass before it can be pronounced sufficiently saturated 
with sugar. It is now boiled in a still stronger syrup, of a density 
of 40deg., by the testing tube; and this is done in large copper 
vessels over a slow coke fire—care being taken to prevent the peel 
from adhering to the side of the vessel by gentle stirring with a long 
paddle-shaped ladle. The second boiling will oceupy about an hour. 
Taken off the fire, the vessels are carried to a large wooden trough, 
over which is spread a coarse, open wire netting. The contents are 
poured over this, and the peel distributed over the surface of the 
netting; so that the syrup, now thickened to the consistency of 
treacle, may drain off the surface of the peel into the trough below. 
The peel has now taken up as much sugar as is necessary. 
