The Canton mail. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 18??-1882, 1876-04-22
NUMBER 40.
4RCHIS HYPOGKA.

Ho,c This PIebian Nat Is Prepared for
| Market.
The peanut businesses large enough
to be interesting. Successfully Guilt
waited they are more profitable than cot
| ton or tobacco, and the farmers of Vir-
ginia, North Carolina, Florida and Ten
nessee are turning their attention to
them. Virginia is the greatest peanut
state, and from the counties on the
James river there are yearly supplied to
| northern markets thousands of bushels.
These nuts are large and of fine flavor.
From North Carolina comes the smaller
or Africa" peanuts, and some are real
ly imported from Africa. These are
small and of inferior flavor. Formerly
the cleaning, Smelling and sorting were
done by hand, but now machinery does
the work better.
al pay for the nuts in the market
from 81 to $3.50 a bushel," said Mr..
Vellines, Washington street dealer, to
a Sun reporter, "and buy most of them
of commission merchants on the wharves,
for find it does not pay to ship them
myself When the nuts come to us they
are as you see them in this bag, dirty,
mixed with vines, many of them light
or broken, shucks and meats altogether.
Now, if you will come up stairs I'll show
you the process through which we put
them"
There was on the fourth floor of the
establishment large wooden cylinder,
ten feet long, four feet in diameter and
open at the ends. 1t was revolving
rapidly, and into one end from a large
hopper was pouring steady stream of
dirty peanuts; and from the other end a |
stream of clean ones-the dirt rubbed |
off by attrition. They fell into hopper
in the floor and disappeared.
"There is fan just below the floor"
said Mr.. Vellines, (Which blows all the
dirt, and chat, and vines, and sAucks
out from the nuts, and the mass passes
into bags below. The nuts run down to
a travelling wooden apron below, where
they are assorted by girls. Before we
90 down 1 want you to see the shelters.
We used to pay from five to ten cents
a pound to have them shelled by hand,
md a shelter could not average more
han fifty pounds day. Now we can
she'll twenty-four hundred pounds day
or cent pound. Here are the she'll
RS. Into these hoppers are put all the
,oorer and smaller nuts, and, as you see,
hey pass into the shelter, which cuts
Up the shells. Meats and shells pass down
o the floor below, where they are sepa- {
ated by a fan. The meats are then
,assed through graduated sleeves, worked
" hand, and assorted into five different
ICES, that bring from five to fourteen {
ents pound. Without this asserting
hey would only sell for seven cents a
'ound. We shall soon do all the assort-
ng by machinery"
On the third floor four Italian girls g
TODD before the travelling apron, and, as
he nuts came into view, they deity v
licked out the bad ones, and the larger =
Lream of good nuts passed down out of q
Sio. vi thC iioOi DCiOW tHCIC was d |
lrge inclined table, upon which a stream t
large bright peanuts was falling. h
hree girls picked out the few bad nuts f.
nat had escaped the fingers of the girls q
bove. The nuts passed from the table A
ito large sacks, and were ready for n
lie.
The poorer ones that you see the girls :,
licked out above" said Mr.. Vcllines,
,e again taken up stairs and shelled Z I,
nd sold to the confectioners. The meats =,
are good, of course. The shells are =,
'ound into small pieces, and we sell
yery bit from a cent to cent and a half
pound. They go to Philadelphia and ,
and 1 think are used in max =
6 feed, for there is good DIAL Of nu- a.
iment in peanut shell. Here" point "
e to furnace, is where we roast the
,anuts. That cylinder holds ten bush fir
S. After the nuts are thus cleaned al
i'd assorted, the best sell for from 81 to m
80 bushel." m