CUBA— THE SUGAR MILL OF THE ANTILLES 27 



human means. If man knew how to do thick on their face. Such are the trains 



that, every corn-field would be a sugar- of gears that transmit the power from 



field. the engines to the rolls. 



The main body of the stalk is cut down After the juice is pressed out of the 



and loaded into the ox-carts as shown on cane it is thoroughly strained and pumped 



page 13. In these it is hauled to the into big tanks at the top of the building, 



field station and placed in the waiting where a milk-of-lime solution — in other 



cars. Each car contains about twenty words, plain whitewash — is added, 

 tons and each train is made up of thirty The mixture is then heated to a degree 



cars. This makes six hundred tons of just above the boiling-point. The lime 



cane to the trainload, and eight to ten neutralizes the acid in the juice and finds 



trainloads a day are required to keep one affinities in some of the foreign sub- 



of the bigger centrals in operation for stances. It pulls these to the bottom and 



twenty-four hours. The big United Fruit plays the same role of purifier in the 



central, at Preston, requires the crop making of sugar that it plays in the mak- 



from 250 acres every day to keep it busy, ing of iron. The heat causes the other 



Imagine a field three-fifths of a mile impurities to rise to the surface as scum. 



square being harvested between sun-up so that when this preliminary process is 



and sundown to keep one central going! completed in the big settling tanks there 



« ^ ^ ^»^ TTT ^ ~ TTT , ,. TTT is a top laver of froth, a middle layer of 



WHEN THE CANE REACHES THE MILL , - 1 • " , , ' , z a 



clear juice, and a bottom layer of mud- 



When the cane reaches the mill in the like solid material, 

 most modern plants, the cars are run, one The clear juice is drawn off and passed 



by one, into a cradle and made fast through filters of excelsior. It is then 



thereto. A button is pressed and the pumped to the evaporators, where about 



cradle rocks over on one side. The side half of the water is boiled out of it. 

 of the car swings loose and the load rolls 



out into a deep trench, at the bottom of H0W TH * M0D * RN Evaporator works 

 which is an endless steel belt. In the more modern factories there is 



On this belt the cane is carried up to a chain of four evaporators working to- 



the crushing rolls. A man stands before gether. We all learned in our school 



a keyboard and by pressing the several days that the lighter the air pressure, the 



electric buttons thereon regulates the flow lower the temperature at which liquids 



through the crusher, which disrupts all boil. The sugar manufacturer makes use 



the little sap cells and releases a great of that principle in his factory. By means 



stream of foamy juice, as shown on page of air pumps he reduces the atmospheric 



17. Then the crushed cane is sent pressure in each evaporator to a point 



through sets of rollers, each time under below that of the preceding one. 

 heavy pressure. The steam that boils the juice in the 



Each set of rolls the cane passes first evaporator must have a temperature 



through presses it harder than the one of 215 Fahrenheit. When this steam 



before. The last set may exert a press- falls below that temperature it passes into 



ure of a million pounds, and when the the coils of the second evaporator, where 



"bagasse," as the crushed cane is called, the air pressure is so reduced that the 



issues from them it is almost as dry as partially cooled steam makes the liquid 



tinder. It is carried by conveyers to the boil at 203 °. After it falls below that 



fire-boxes of the boilers, where it is used point the steam passes on to the third 



as fuel in generating the steam that evaporator, where, with a still further 



drives the big mills and boils the cane reduced air pressure, it is able to keep 



juice. The stream of crushed cane flows the syrup boiling until it falls below 180 . 



through the last set of rolls at a speed of The fourth evaporator has the air pres- 



seven miles a day. sure reduced to a practical vacuum. The 



steam that has lost so much of its heat. 



MIXING WHITEWASH WITH CANE JUICE as tQ be lmaMe tQ maintain the boi W_ 



x t> 



Imagine big gear-wheels fourteen feet point in the third is nevertheless hot 

 in diameter, with cogs sixteen inches enough to keep the juice boiling in the 

 long, three inches deep, and two inches fourth. Here only 150 of heat is needed 



