Report of Society's Meetings. 143 
amount of sucrose in British Guiana cane juice does not 
even exceed 1*65 lb. per gallon, or 15^ per cent. On 
what possible foundation then, rests the assumption 
that the cane itself ordinarily contains 18 to 21 per cent. 
of sugar?* 
The principal analyses of sugar-cane that have been 
recorded, with the dates w T hen they were made as far as 
I can ascertain, are as follows : — 
Avequin Peligot Dupuy 
(1835) (1839) (1840) 
Otaheite Cane. Ribbon Cane. Martinique Guadeloupe. 
Cane. Cane. 
Water 76-080 76728 Water 72*1 Water 72-0 
Sugar 14-280 13-392 Sugar i8'o Sugar 17-8 
Cellulose 8-867 9-071 Fibre 9-9 Cellulose.... 9-8 
Albumen, &c. -415 '44 1 Sa l ts '4 
Salts -358 -368 
Casaseca (about 1840.) 
Cuban Cane. Otaheite Cane. 
Water 77-8 71-04 
Sugar, &c. 16-2 18-00 
Fibre, &c. 60 10-96 
* Certain statements found in books are only explicable by supposing 
that per centage of sugar in cane has been confused with per centage 
of sugar in juice. Thus Fliikiger and Hanbury, reputed to be most 
careful observers and commentators, after stating {op cit.) that cane 
contains 18 to 21 per cent, of sugar, immediately show that average 
juice only contains about 18 per cent. 
On page 127 of Sugar Growing and Refining by Lock, Wigner and 
Harland, it is set forth that " canes yielding 90 per cent, of juice of 
10° Bm. contains 18-58 per cent, of total saccharine matter" and lower 
down on the same page, that " canes giving 86 per cent, of juice of 
ii° Bm. contain 19-20 per cent of total saccharine matter." Certain 
important conclusions are based on these data, apparently in all good 
faith, and it does not seem to have dawned on the writers that juice 
of the density specified could hardly contain as great a per centage of 
sugar as that assigned to the cane. 
