208 
PROPERTIES OF INDIAN CORN. 
PROPERTIES OF INDIAN CORN. 
In our last volume, we noticed Dr. Jackson’s 
Final Report on the Geology and Mineralogy of 
New Hampshire, with a promise of making copious 
extracts in some future numbers. W e now fulfil 
that promise by giving the following condensed ac¬ 
count of the properties and adaptation of Indian 
corn, and several other grains, trusting that it will 
be no less acceptable to those of our readers at 
home who have not seen Dr. Jackson’s Report, 
than to our trans-Atlantic brethren, who have of 
late directed their attention to this important 
subject. 
Some interesting facts will be noticed in the va¬ 
riable proportions of phosphates in different varieties 
of the same species of grain, and the great prepon¬ 
derance of them in Indian corn, beyond what is 
Contained in the smaller grains, like barley, oats, 
and wheat; a fact that seems to explain their pecu¬ 
liar properties as food for animals; the more highly 
phosphatic grains being more likely to surcharge 
the system of adult animals with bony matter, pro¬ 
ducing concretions of phosphate of lime, like those 
resulting from gout. 
Perhaps that stiffness of the joints and lameness 
of the feet, common in horses fed too freely with 
corn, may be accounted for by this preponderance 
of the phosphates. Young animals cannot fail to 
derive more osseous matter from corn than from 
other food. 
The gluten and mucilage contain nitrogen, an 
element essential to the formation of fibrous tissue, 
muscles, nervous matter, and brain. 
The oil is ready-formed fat, easily convertible 
into animal oils by a slight change of composition. 
Starch is convertible, also, into fat and into the 
carbonaceous substances of the body, and, during 
its slow combustion in the circulation, gives out a 
portion of the heat of animal bodies; while, in its 
altered state, it goes to form a part of the living 
frame. Sugar acts in a similar manner, as a com¬ 
pound of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, in the 
formation of fat of animal bodies. 
From the phosphates, the substance of bone and 
the saline matters of brains, nerves, and other solid 
and fluid parts of the body, are, in a great measure, 
derived. 
The salts of iron go to the blood, and there con¬ 
stitute an essential portion of it, whereby it is en¬ 
abled, by successive alterations of its degrees of 
oxidation during the circulation through the lungs, 
arteries, extreme vessels and veins, to transport 
oxygen to every part of the body. 
Buckwheat and oats contain the least proportion, 
and may be raised on soil which is not fully sup¬ 
plied with phosphates. 
Beans and peas are highly charged with the 
phosphates of lime and magnesia, while they con¬ 
tain but very little starch. They also contain salts 
of iron, and both the cotyledon and the germ are 
charged with all these salts; but the epidermis, or 
skin of the bean or pea, is free from them. 
The use of the oil in corn is obviously to prevent 
the rapid decomposition of the grain in the soil, and 
to retain a portion of food until needed by the 
young plant, and is always the last portion of the 
grain taken up. It serves to keep meal from sour¬ 
ing readily, and it will be observed that a flint corn 
meal will keep sweet for years, even when put up 
in large quantities; blit the Tuscarora meal will 
sour in a short time. The latter is the most diges¬ 
tible grain for horses, and is soft, but it is of little 
value for feeding swine. It is a good kind of grain 
for rapid cooking, for its meal is quickly boiled 
or baked. 
Oily corn makes a dry kind of bread, and is not 
adhesive enough to rise well, without admixture of 
rye or flour. Rice corn is so dry that alone it will 
not make bread, but is dry like sand. 
Oily grains are excellent for fattening fowls, and 
the rice corn, both from its size and oily nature, is 
admirably adapted for them. 
Corn is sometimes raised for the manufacture of 
whisky, and the oil is saved during the fermenta¬ 
tion, since it separates and rises to the surface. I 
have been informed that 100 bushels of corn yield 
from fifteen to sixteen gallons of oil. It is made on 
the borders of Lake Ontario, and has been used in 
the light-houses on the lake. 
According to my analyses, the proportions of oil 
in Indian corn vary from six to eleven per cent., 
the latter being the yield from Canada corn ; while 
rice corn contains still more, but has not been fully 
examined. 
Southern corn has more starch and less oil than 
our northern flint corn, and is much softer and bet¬ 
ter food for horses, though not so fattening for 
swine or poultry, and is, when ground, more apt to 
become sour. 
When Indian corn is hulled by means of potash 
ley, the oil next to the epidermis of the grain is 
converted into soap, and the epidermis is detached. 
The caustic alkali also liberates ammonia from the 
mucilage around the germ. 
Sweet corn appears like an unripe grain. Its 
origin is unknown; but it' appears to have been 
used by the aboriginal inhabitants of New Eng¬ 
land, anterior to the settlement of the country by 
the Pilgrims. 
It is a remarkable variety of corn, containing aia 
unusually large proportion of phosphates, and a 
large quantity of sugar and gum, and but little 
starch. 
Its excellence for food in its green state is well 
known and appreciated, and having stalks which 
are short and slender, they of course take up a less 
proportion of the saline matters of the soil. 
The colors of Indian corn depend on that of the 
epidermis, or hull, and of the oil; the latter, when 
yellow, showing its color through a transparent 
epidermis; while if the hull is colored and opaque, 
the grain presents the same color. 
In the Rhode Island white flint (a favorite grain 
in that State), the oil is transparent and colorie.ss, 
and the epidermis is likewise free from color and is 
nearly transparent; hence, the meal is white, and 
the quantity of oil being large, it is less liable to 
ferment and become sour than some other varieties, 
and is in very good repute. 
The yellow color of the golden Sioux, a twelve 
rowed kind of corn, is due to the color of the oil. 
Brown com has a darker color, dependent on the 
combined colors of the oil and epidermis. 
Red and blue corn owe their lively hues to the 
colors of the epidermis, and not to the oiL 
