Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1879-04-09
C0rn-StaIk Sugar.

being taken in Maine and Massachusetts,, in
the manufacture of sugar from beets. The
Maine people made successful start last
year, and something like one hundred thou
sand pounds Of refined beet sugar was pro-
duced at the works in Portland. This year
it is expected to increase the quantity ten
or twenty fold, and to partially settle the
question whether permanent business can
be established.
In Massachusetts, the subject has grow
ing interest with the farmers, especially of
the Connecticut valley, and there is fair
prospect that mandatory may be estab-
lished there. The agricultural and other
papers of the two states take the matter up
with energy part of which, however, is
wasted in "skitting at the idea of making
sugar of anything else but beets. 1t has
got to be so much the fashion for all the
newspapers to make fun of the agricultural
department at Washington, that any propo-
sition emanatiug from its head is almost sure
to be received with ridicule. And as the
chemist of the department has been lately
experimenting in regard to the possibility
of making cane sugar from the stalks of
corn and sorghum, under a new process,
the Writings have taken this up as new in
dication of faulty in our national oversight
of farming matters. As usual, those who
talk the most positively show the densest ig-
norance of the subject. Thus the Boston Cui-
tivator says:
"If the production OF sugar from Louisiana
sugar cane Is not remunerative industry, how
can 1t be expected that a profitable industry can
be secured through expressing the juice from
corn-stalks in the North. Beet sugar is the only
commercial sugar product of the temperate zone
that is practicable to handle in large quantities.
Now man must be unusually ignorant
of the statistics of our agricultural industry
(even for an agricultural editor) not to
know that the sugar industry of Louisiana
has been extremely profitable, and that the
seeming decline since the war has been due,
not to lack of profit in the business, but to
the destruction of the Mississippi levees and
the disturbed political and social condition
of Louisiana Later, the Cultivdtor, urging
the sugar beet culture, goes out of its way
to say:
Every few weeks we see this matter OF sugar
from sorghum and from Indian corn paraded be-
fore the public in the journals, on high au-
thority, and are told that process has been dis
covered by which sugar Of the best quality may
ho toh vtrac frnp t,lan I
can't be DONE and no process is likely to be dis
covered by anybody that will transform the nature
and makeup OF these plants into frst-class sugar
yielding crops"
Now we do not know that corn-stalk and
sorghum sugar making can be made sue
cess in New England. Neither does the
editor of the Cuuivator know that beet
sugar can be produced here at profit. One
thing, however, is well known namely, that
the experiment with beet sugar can never
be conclusively tried without vast expend-
iture of capital, mounting up to millions.
The State of Maine pays bonus of seven
thousand dollars year for ten years to the
experimenters who have taken up the mat
ter in that state, and the private capital in
vested is nearly or quite one hundred thou
sand dollars. Even this large investment is
only experimental and preliminary.
On the other hand if the State of Ver-
mont would appropriate two or three thou
sand dollars, to be divided, say, in one hun
dred dollar premiums among the farmers of
the state, the question of profit from corn
stalk sugar, or syrup, could be settled with
little delay. Let such experienced maple
sugar-makers as A. NJ. Foster, of Cabot, for
instance (and the state has hundreds like
lions as to the ease aud certainty of manu-
facture, the kind of corn yielding most sach.
airline, and the actual yield of sugar and
syrup per acre, would be decided by the
most practical tests while the samples pre-
sented at the State House with the claims
for share in the premiums would enable
hundreds of people from all parts of the
state to test the quality and value of the
product
We have before us specimens of the sugar
made by Professor Collier last Summer, al
the department of agriculture, from both
corn-stalks and the amber sorghum. The
process was very imperfect and rude, much
more so than the manufacture Of maple su
gar by our best makers, yet we do not hest
tate to pronounce the corn-stalk sugar more
than equal in quality to an average sample
of stirred Vermont maple sugar. 1t has a:
pure a taste as the best West India or Loui
siana sugar. This was quite unexpected t.
but it has no other taste, good or bad, dis
tinguishing it from the best unrefned can
sugar. The sorghum sugar, though Of goo
color and grain, has taste something lik
molasses candy, not unpleasant but still nc
so much like good commercial sugar as W
should like to see. 1t is proper to say, how
ever, that the stalks from which the sorghur
sugar was made were grown far too thickl,
and were too immature for the best result
We are inclined to think that the corr
stalk is more promising as source of prof
and good sugar, in Vermont, than the SO
ghum. 1t is earlier, and the manufactuI
can be begun and finished earlier in til
season, before hard frosts. The time
press it is not until the ears are full in I'll
milk, which gives us double crop, II
ears, leaves, tops and pressed stalks beir
Just what most Of our farmers want to fee
to their COWS and fat their pigs with, viii
the sugar and syrup are an extra, and Il
process of manufacture differs so little fro
that of maple sugar that any one of orc
nary skill in such work can easily becon
proficient in it. 1t is plain that Septemb
and October is pleasanter season for sugs
making than March, and that the labor
cutting and pressing the stalks would be
greater, If as great, as the tapping of tire
and the gathering of sap; while the cost
the mill would take the place of the cost
buckets. The making differs in no respe
from that of maple sugar; the same evaI
rators and pans being used the only adj
tional process is that Of defeating (clarii
ing) the juice, which is rapidly and simp
effected over separate furnace in metal
tank or kettle