rochleder's  proximate  analysis. 
273 
What  is  done  in  St.  Vincent  may  be  done  in  Jamaica.  The 
trash-houses  of  the  past  could  easily  be  converted  into  drying 
houses  for  the  future  on  any  old  sugar  estate  having  a  supply  of 
water.  The  water  which  might  easily  be  made  to  turn  a 
cassava  mill  with  two  pairs  of  rollers,  the  boiling,  curing,  and 
still  houses  might  all  be  transformed  and  brought  into  use  for 
cassava  ;  and  with  the  ingenious  contrivance  of  our  Island 
architect,  Mr.  Leahy,  of  having  blades  of  glass,  the  drying-house 
might  be  thoroughly  ventilated.  I  would  not  only  have  a  glass 
roof,  but  for  the  most  part  glass  walls,  thorough  ventilation,  and 
thus  lessen  the  time  to  the  minimum  for  thorough  drying. 
The  cost,  then,  of  transformation  would  be  very  moderate  in- 
deed. The  metal  of  the  sugar  boilers  and  still  would  pay,  or 
nearly  pay,  for  the  vessels  required  for  the  cassava. 
There  is  no  duty  on  glass  manufacture,  and  large  slabs  of  thick 
glass  cost  little  in  England.  The  cost  of  manufacture  of  starch 
and  blocking  the  fibre,  would  certainly  be  less  than  the  cost  of 
sugar  manufacture. 
To  any  one,  then,  who  will  turn  his  attention  to  cassava,  he 
would  certainly  have  a  prospect  before  him  of  making  an  old 
sugar  estate  a  handsomely  paying  concern  as  a  cassava  planta- 
tion.— Ohem.  N^ews,  London,  from  Jamaica  Guardian. 
PROXLMATE  ANALYSIS  OF  PLANTS,  ETC. 
(Continued  from  page  184.) 
FURTHER  INVESTIGATION  OF  THE  SEVEN  DIFFERENT  SOLUTIONS,  AND 
THE  DISTILLATE  OBTAINED  FROM  THE  AQUEOUS  DECOCTION. 
Section  I. — Examination  of  the  aqueous  decoction  and  the  distillate  there- 
with obtained. 
A. — Examination  of  the  distillate. 
The  watery  distillate,  which  is  obtained  by  the  decoction  of  the  material 
with  water  according  to  the  previous  directions,  is  either  a  clear  or  a  turbid 
fluid.  It  has  either  a  film  of  oil  floating  on  the  surface,  or  precipitated  at 
the  bottom,  or  not.  If  the  distillate  is  a  clear  fluid,  it  contains  either  only 
a  very  little  quantity  of  substances  sparingly  soluble  in  water,  or  none  of 
these  substances.  If  the  water  is  turbid  from  the  separated  oil  globules  or, 
solid  particles,  it  contains  little  of  substances  diflScultly  soluble  in  water 
or  much  of  readily  soluble  ones.  The  water  at  first,  when  a  layer  of  oil 
has  collected  at  the  top  or  bottom,  mechanically  separated  from  the  oil. 
18 
