20 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
maceration remains doubtful, in consequence of too much complexity- 
in the apparatus for its performance, the increase of the quantity of 
fuel necessary for evaporating from 25 to 33 per cent more water, 
and the difficulty of using or transporting the dregs or residue, the 
weight of which exceeds that of the roots employed. It is of high 
importance that all uncertainty on this point should be settled. 
Lime to be 'preparedfor clarifying the juice. —It is very important to 
procure strong lime of good quality, and to slake it when about to 
use it with hot water, and finally, to add gradually a sufficient quan¬ 
tity of water, so that the lime may undergo the greatest possible di¬ 
vision. The stones which do not slake should be replaced by an 
equal weight of quick lime, which should be slaked with the same 
precautions. 
Instead of weighing, the lime may be measured, either by using 
the paste of lime, previously slaked, of a certain consistence, and 
kept under water, or the milk of lime, the thickness of which, or its 
degree of strength, may be estimated by the areometer,* * * § * or by any 
other floating body, taking care to immerse and observe it the very 
moment when the liquid has just been well agitated. It is well al¬ 
ways to rinse, with milk of lime, all the utensils after washing them, 
in order to prevent the formation of an acid. 
Defecation—or purifying the juice. —It is at the moment when the 
juice attains a degree of heat that is insupportable to the finger, 
(from 70 to 80 degrees,)! that the milk of lime is poured in, the 
whole stirred briskly, and then the scum suffered to rise. (It has 
been proposed to saturate the juice of the beets without heat, imme¬ 
diately after its extraction. This mode of proceeding appears plau¬ 
sible ; but experiments properly conducted, and their results com¬ 
pared, are necessary to settle opinions on this subject.) As soon as 
boiling commences, the fire is put out, or the stop cock in the steam 
pipe closed, if the heat is communicated by steam. It is left at rest 
for six or eight minutes, and then drawn off clear. 
The scum, gradually pressed, yields a part of its juice; it is then 
usefully employed as a manure, after having been dried by mixing it 
with lime in a state of powder. The clear or defecated juice should 
immediately run through a filter of coarse animal charcoal, which 
has already once served to clarify the concentrated syrup of a pre¬ 
ceding operation. Thus the defecated juice washes the animal char¬ 
coal, and at the same time purifies itself. 
Several new methods of rendering the defecation more complete, 
and producing less change in the sugar, are at this time proposed, 
the effects and usefulness of which competitors would do well to ob¬ 
serve. As fast as the juice passes through the filter, it is evaporated 
to 25° ;t then, after having left it to settle in some receiver, it is 
poured on a second filter of coarse animal charcoal, \yhen the purifi¬ 
cation is finished. It is above all important to perform this opera¬ 
tion with all the expedition which can be obtained from the shallow¬ 
ness of the boiler and the facility of transferring the liquor from one 
vessel into another. 
During the first moments of the evaporation, it is well to add the 
portion of fine charcoal separated in the revivication.§ This fine 
charcoal is in part brought to the surface with the scum, which is 
taken off to be added, after the lime, to a subsequent defecation ; this 
scum is then added to the first, and is treated simultaneously with 
it. The syrupy deposites in the receiver are ^Uso added to a subse¬ 
quent defecation. 
The syrup obtained, filtered at 25°, may be left some hours with 
as little inconvenience as the weaker syrups, in order to obtain some 
rest; it ought then to be boiled briskly in a caldron in full ebulli¬ 
tion at every point. If too much froth seems to rise, which happens 
especially when the dose of lime employed has been too weak, a 
small lump of butter should be thrown in, which will allay it; when 
an excess of lime has been used, the ebullition towards the close of 
the boiling is very slight, especially if the coarse charcoal was not 
sufficiently absorbent, or employed in sufficient quantities. It is to 
be observed in this case, that the liquid, once in the state of syrup, 
boils so little and loses so little vapor, that it is said then the syrup 
(clairee) is immoveable. 
The committee have thought that the process of blowing in hot 
air, (insufflation) reduced to its most simple form, would render the 
operation of boiling more easy to farmers than any other, mode, and 
* An instrument to ascertain the weight of liquids.—T r. 
t Reaumer Scale—70° to 80° of which are equal to 190 to 212 Fahrenheit.— 
Tr. 
i Whether this is the Hydrometer or Saccharometer is not stated.—T r. 
§ An operation that will be described in another place.—T r. 
the danger of immoveable syrups thereby completely avoided: To 
this end, a fine bellows furnished with a good valve to guard against 
the return of the heated air, might suffice for forcing in the air, 
which after having passed through a heated cast iron tube, would 
issue near the bottom of the pan, by several holes in a tube that tra¬ 
verses the syrup.* But this process forming a base of a patent it 
might perhaps be necessary that competitors should have an under¬ 
standing with the patentee, Mr. Brame Chevallier, unless this manu¬ 
facturer should himself become a competitor. 
As soon as the liquid is so reduced that a drop pressed between 
the thumb and forefinger forms, when' the latter is suddenly separat¬ 
ed, a thread which breaks and bends, the evaporation is completed. 
There are other means for taking the proof, and it would be well to 
determine which is the most certain for peVsons unaccustomed to 
conducting these operations. If one boiling was continued too long, 
the next quantity might be evaporated less, so as to compensate for 
the excess. 
The boiled syrup is poured into a cooler, made of copper or wood, 
of dimensions sufficient to contain the whole of four or five boilings, 
the whole is gently stirred from time to time to hasten the cooling, 
and the formation of some crystals; the whole is then poured into 
conical moulds of earthenware. Wooden vessels, or even tin chris- 
tallizers, which might be made and easily repaired in almost every 
village, would probably be preferable to earthen moulds; competitors 
will try to discover whether there is not some other vessel more 
convenient and economical. At the end of two or three days, when 
the. crystallization is completed, it is left to drain in a place, the 
temperature of which should be kept constantly at from 18 to 20°.f 
The opening in the bottom of the mould should be uncorked, and the 
mould placed erect over a pot, or on a kind of bottle decimer and 
in this last case, the moulds are placed over a gutter of cast copper, 
fanned, or one cut out of free stone,’ leading to a small reservoir be¬ 
low, sunk into the earth. If tm crystallizers are used, these are 
placed vertically, in pairs, with their brims applied to each other, 
over a gutter of lead or tin. If the draining has been performed in 
a damp situation, there takes place a kind of natural separation, 
which is sufficient to make the sugar fit for ordinary consumption. 
This was the case in a manufactory belonging to one of this commit¬ 
tee ; the raw sugar kept for three months had lost its original dis¬ 
agreeable smell, and was directly consumed. 
The molasses reboiled yields a second crystallization, but more 
slowly. This takes place as well in the crystallizers, and the drain¬ 
ing may be performed through a cloth placed in the bottom of the 
moulds. Finally, a third crystallization may be obtained by putting 
the crystallizers into a hot-house, or as is the usual practice, in re¬ 
servoirs, where the second molasses daily accumulating, is left for a 
whole year. ( To be continued.) 
FOREST AND TIMBER TREES—OSAGE ORANGE—SILK-COTTON AND 
SUGAR BEET AGRICULTURE. 
Nonantum Hill, Newton, Mass. Feb. 8, 1837. 
J. Buel, Esq. —Dear Sir —I am induced to send you a few remarks 
on timber trees, to which I shall add some observations on other 
subjects. I was induced to this at first, by an observation in one of 
the late numbers of your highly valuable Cultivator, where, in 
speaking of the Osage Orange, ( Madura aurantiaca,) you say, “ The 
Osage Orange is tender, even more tender than the Morus Mullicaulis, 
as it had been killed down to the ground with you every winter .” These 
are the words as near as I can recollect, in substance. I had stated 
in some of the periodicals last spring, which I have seen copied into 
other journals at Hartford and Albany, That the Osage Orange was 
a hardy tree, as it had sustained the rigors of the last severe winters near 
Boston. I have two trees standing on the hill where I reside, one 
seven and the other eight inches in circumference, the one ten feet 
high and the other eleven feet; here they have stood since the spring 
of 1829, and without any protection, and are yet uninjured by our most 
severe winters; one in a northernly and bleak exposition, the other 
northwesterly. The soil loamy and springy, resting on solid hard 
pan of gravelly clay. The tree being yet rare here, I know none so 
large in this state except at the Botanic Garden in Cambridge, where 
* The sufflation, or the blowing in hot air, would also greatly hasten the 
first evaporation, and might be practicable in the country, where hand labor is 
often very cheap. 
t 72J to 811° Fahrenheit.—T r. 
t A board pierced with holes, into which the neck of the inverted bottles are 
put to drain them.—T r. 
