The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom: Considered in Their Various Uses to Man and in Their Relation to the Arts and Manufactures; Forming a Practical Treatise & Handbook of Reference for the Colonist, Manufacturer, Merchant, and Consumer, on the Cultivation, Preparation for Shipment, and Commercial Value, &c. of the Various Substances Obtained From Trees and Plants, Entering into the Husbandry of Tropical and Sub-tropical Regions, &c.Simmonds, P. L. (Peter Lund)
Science
The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom: Considered in Their Various Uses to Man and in Their Relation to the Arts and Manufactures; Forming a Practical Treatise & Handbook of Reference for the Colonist, Manufacturer, Merchant, and Consumer, on the Cultivation, Preparation for Shipment, and Commercial Value, &c. of the Various Substances Obtained From Trees and Plants, Entering into the Husbandry of Tropical and Sub-tropical Regions, &c.
Simmonds, P. L. (Peter Lund)
Botany, Economic
The points which appeared to me worthy of remark in visiting the
beet-root sugar works are, the extreme care that nothing shall be
lost--the great attention paid to cleanliness in every part of the
process, besides the particular care given to defecation. No vessel
is ever used twice without being thoroughly washed. Such a thing as
the employment of an open fire in any part of the manufacture is
quite unknown. Everything is done by steam, of a pressure of from 4
to 5 atmospheres. In the more recently started works, the
evaporation is entirely carried on in vacuum. In some of the older
works copper evaporators, heated by coils of steam piping, and
having covers, with chimneys to carry off the vapor, are still used;
but of the eight works I visited I only saw them in use in one of
them, and they are nowhere used excepting to evaporate to the point
when the second filtration takes place.
The coolers I saw were invariably made of iron, and varied in depth
from 2 to over 6 feet. These very deep vessels are used for the
crystallization of sugar, made of the fourth, fifth and sixth
re-boilings of molasses, which requires from three to six months.
One thing struck me forcibly in going over the French and Belgian
works; it was the extreme liberality with which I was allowed to go
over every part of them; to remain in them as long as I pleased; had
all my inquiries answered, and every explanation given; in most
striking contrast to the grudging manner in which I have been
trotted over some of the refineries in England, as if those who
showed them were afraid I should gain any information on the subject
of their trade.
Mr. H. Colman, speaking of the agriculture of the Continent, gives
some information he obtained on the comparative cost of producing beet
and cane sugar. A hectare (two and a half acres) produces, in the Isle
of Bourbon, about 76,000 kilogrammes (a kilogramme is nearly two and
one-fifth pounds) of cane, which will give 2,200 kilogrammes of sugar,
and the cost for labor is 2,500 francs. A hectare of beet root
produces 40,000 kilogrammes of roots, which yield 2,400 kilogrammes of
sugar, and the expense of the culture is 354 francs. The cost of the
cane sugar in this case is 27 centimes, and of the beet sugar 14
centimes only, per kilogramme.
These are extraordinary statements, and will be looked at by the
political economist and the philanthropist with great interest. There
are few of the northern states of Europe, or of the United States,
which might not produce their own sugar; and when we take into account
the value of this product, even in its remains after the sugar is
extracted, for the fattening of cattle and sheep, and of course for
the enrichment of the land for the succeeding crops, its important
bearing upon agricultural improvement cannot be exaggerated.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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