At the top of the pilone, so placed with the cone turned down, a layer of clay is spread over the sugar, as it has the property of attracting all the impurities to itself; so that the parts of the sugar in the pilone next to the clay are certain to be of the whitest and best colour, whilst the sugar at the bottom, or next the opening of the cone, is the darkest and most valueless, until it has had its turn of the clay; for when the Chinamen perceive that the top part of the sugar in the pilone or earthen jar has attained a certain degree of whiteness, they separate the white from the darker coloured, and the greyish tinged sugar from the dark brown coloured portion at the foot of the jar; and after exposing the white and greyish coloured to the sun, they are packed up, while the dark brown portion, after being mixed with that of a similar colour, is again consigned to the pilone to be clayed. Besides clay, some portions of the stem of the plantain-tree are said to have the power of extracting the impurities from sugar, and in some districts are said to be preferred to clay for that purpose, being chopped up in small pieces, and spread over it. The unclayed descriptions of sugar are generally procurable at Manilla by the end of February, when the new crop commences to come in; and clayed, or the new crop, is seldom ready for delivery before the middle of March. The entire crop is all ready for export by the end of April, although the market is seldom cleared of it till the January of the ensuing year, when the sugar clayers being anxious to close their accounts of the past crop, and wind up all that remains in their camarines, in order to be ready for the new season's operations, are sometimes willing to make a reduction in the nominal price of the day, in order to effect that purpose. But as the grain of sugar does not improve by keeping, especially when it has to stand the moistness of the atmosphere during the preceding wet season, such sugar, if bought at that time, is seldom equal in grain to the produce of the new crop, although its colour may be preferable.