Good sugar-beets possess the following broad characteristics: (1) Regular pear-shaped form and smooth skin; long, tapering, carrot-like roots are considered inferior; (2) white and firm flesh, delicate and uniform structure, and clean sugary flavor; thick-skinned roots are spongy and watery; those with large leaves are generally richer; (3) average weight 1-1/2 to 2-1/2 lbs., neither very large nor very small roots being profitable to the sugar-manufacturer; as a rule, beets weighing more than 3-1/2 lbs. are watery, and poor in sugar; and roots weighing less than 3/4 lb. are either unripe or too woody, and in either case yield comparatively little sugar; the sp. gr. of the expressed juice, usually 1.06 to 1.07, even reaching 1.078 in English-grown roots, indicating over 14 per cent. of crystallizable sugar, is the best proof of quality; juice poor in sugar has a density below 1.060; (4) in well-cultivated soil, the roots grow entirely in the ground, and throw up leaves of moderate size. =Composition of the Roots.= Internally the root is built up of small cells, each filled with a juice consisting of a watery solution of many bodies besides sugar. These include several crystallized salts (mostly of which are present in minute traces only), such as the phosphates, oxalates, malates, and chlorides of potassium, sodium, and calcium, the salts of potash being by far the most important; and several colloid bodies (albuminous [nitrogenous] and pectinous compounds); as well as a substance which rapidly blackens on exposure to the air. The greater part of the sugar in ripe beets is crystallizable, and, when perfectly pure, is identical in composition and properties with crystallized cane-sugar; but it is more difficult to refine this sugar so as to free it from the potash salts, and commercial samples have not nearly so great sweetening power as ordinary cane-sugar. Beets contain no uncrystallizable sugar; the molasses produced in beet-sugar manufactories is the result of changes which cannot be entirely avoided in extracting the crystallizable sugar. =Soil.= The best soil for beets contains a fair proportion of organic matter, is neither too stiff nor too light, and crumbles down into a nice friable loam; it must be capable of being cultivated to a depth of at least 16 in. The subsoil should be thoroughly well drained, and rendered friable by autumn-cultivation and free admission of air. A deep friable turnip-loam, containing fair proportions of clay and lime, appears to be the most eligible land for sugar-beets. Lime is a very desirable element. Well-worked clay-soils, especially calcareous clays, are well adapted, if properly drained and of sufficient depth. Peaty soils and moorlands are quite unsuitable, as well as lands which are too dry, like the thin gravelly soils resting on siliceous gravel sub-soils, or too wet and cold, like many of the thin soils above impervious chalk marl.