Sugar Beet-root. 
159 
The poultry manure was in wet and pasty condition, making 
its ready application difficult ; its manurial value would be 
rather under 11. a ton. The feather waste cost 90s. per ton and 
was good value, the material being dry and in good condition. 
C. Miscellaneous. 
1. Arsenic in Coal , Coke , Sulphur , and Hops. 
The agitation caused by the “ arsenic scare ” in connection 
with materials used in brewing led naturally to the submission 
of a number of samples of coal, coke, &c., used by farmers in 
connection with hop-drying, and also of the finished hops 
themselves. The buyers of hops, in order to secure themselves, 
would only buy subject to the hops being free from arsenic, 
and the hop farmer, in turn, wished to ensure that the coal or 
coke he used, as also the sulphur burnt in the kilns, were free 
from excess of arsenic, so that contamination of the hops could 
not take place. It may be said, generally, that when anthracite 
coal was used it was, as a rule, found to be practically free 
from arsenic ; coke was, however, more or less arsenical, the 
quantity of arsenic exceeding *05 grains per lb., an amount 
which may be taken as the limit allowable. Sulphur, when 
Sicilian sulphur was used, was quite satisfactory, but some 
sulphur obtained from “ recovery ” processes contained exces- 
sive arsenic. With hops much depended upon the kind of coal 
or coke that had been employed, but it was only in a few cases, 
and where coke had been used, that more than Au grain of 
arsenic per lb. was found. 
2. Sugar Beetroot. 
The revival in the prospects of making beet-sugar pro- 
duction a commercial success in this country caused a good 
deal of sugar-beet to be grown experimentally in different 
districts, and several samples of the roots so grown were 
submitted to me for analysis. The season of 1905 was 
particularly favourable to the growth of roots of a character 
such as a factory would desire, viz., a root well-matured 
and not of large size. Hence, one would expect the roots in 
such a season as 1905 to be rich in sugar, and this proved to be 
the case, as the subjoined analyses show. In comparison with 
these results are given some obtained in 1904, exemplifying 
the differences which season will make. 
Sugar-beet grown in 1904. 
1 
2 
3 
4 
Water 
87-07 
88-09 
86-85 
87-92 
Sugar 
7-92 
6-99 
6-80 
6-60 
Crude Fibre 
2-16 
2-06 
2-30 
1-80 
Albuminoids and Ash, &c. 
2-85 
2-86 
4-05 
3-68 
100-00 
100-00 
100-00 
100-00 
