Current Investigations in Economic Botany. 19 
and dried the plants, ground them to powder and exhausted with 
dilute alcohol and crystallized out the sugars. His methods were 
only suited to the laboratory, but he urged the importance of the 
beet as the source of a possible sugar industry. 
Another long interval, this time half a century, elapsed and it 
was not until 1797 that Achard, a French refugee and a former 
pupil of Marggraf again took up the work. After much investigation 
he was successful in extracting sugar from the beet on a considerable 
scale, and in 1799 he presented a specimen of the sugar and gave a 
description of his method to the Institute of France. In this paper 
he stated that the cost of production should not exceed about 3d. 
per lb. Considerable doubt and ridicule was cast upon his work, 
but even this was fruitful, as interest was aroused and a commission 
of chemists was appointed to inquire into the question and to 
repeat Achard’s experiments. 
The report of the commission of enquiry was presented in 
1800. Investigations on other plants are summarized, and attention 
drawn to the failure which had attended the efforts to introduce 
the sugar-cane and the sugar-maple into France. In the beet 
itself they found a little over 6 per cent of sugar. By repeating 
Marggraf’s experiments a muscovado sugar, of a dark colour 
and disagreeable taste was obtained, at an estimated expense 
of 9d. per lb. Among the conclusions arrived at, the commission 
states “ That admitting the results of the experiments it remains 
to be demonstrated that the beet may, up to a certain point, 
supplant the sugar-cane.” 
The next important step appears to have been taken in 
Germany, where in 1805 Baron de Koppy built a factory in Lower 
Silesia capable of dealing with about 500 tons of roots in a year. 
Achard also founded a factory of his own. 
The production of sugar from the beet, and its competition 
with the sugar-cane was not however allowed to remain a question 
of purely scientific and commercial interest. Sugar production 
early became involved in politics, a position from which it has not 
yet finally escaped. At the time now under discussion, approximately 
a century ago, political considerations played a very important part. 
Napoleon I. issued the decrees of Berlin and Milan, establishing a 
Continental blockade, designed to exclude British products and 
manufactures and particularly the products of the British Colonies, 
the more important then being sugar, indigo and cotton. The already 
established beet sugar factories made increased profits, active 
