Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1882-05-08


The stumps are left in the ground,
and from one planting a harvest may
be gathered for three or four years
then it becomes necessary to plow
the ground and plant it in something
else. Usually corn and peas are
planted, the peas being plowed under
for a fertilizer. After one year cane
can again be put in. Like every
other crop, it requires careful atten-
ton and intelligent management.
Both men and women are employ
ed as cane cutters. They use a
broad instrument-neither knife nor
hatchet-with sharp hook-shaped
projection at one end with which the
blades at the top of the cane are
stripped away; with one blow the
stalk is cut down, another and it's
struggling leaves are cut off and it is
ready for the cane wagon, in which
it is hauled to the mill. Then it is
placed upon carrier, controlled by
an endless belt, which takes it up an
inclined plane, to the second story of
the building when it passes between
three powerful rollers which crush it
into atoms and extract every particle
of the juice, leaving the cane as dry
as chip. This juice is similar to
the sap which flows from the maple
trees in the north, but of much less
pleasant flavor. From the rollers
the juice of the cane is carried through
pipes to what might be called receiv-
ing cisterns, passing on its way there
through the smoke of burning sui
phur, which bleaches it. From these
vats or cisterns other pipes convey it
to the first boiler, which will hold
$50 gallons of the liquid. Here
Stacked lime is added, which precipi-
tates all foreign substances and en-
| ables the sugar-maker to remove
them when the liquid approaches boil
ing heat There are six of the boil
ers placed side by side in one arch,
and as the boiling progresses it is
dipped from one to another until it
reaches the last. The dipper used is
bucket fastened to pole, the pole
attached to the side of the arch in the
same manner that oars are fastened
to a rowboat. Two men manipulate
it, and they will change the contents
from one boiler to- another in less
time than it takes me to tell you
about it. In the same manner
long wooden paddle is used to brush
back from the boiling syrup all i'm
purities which rise to the top, those
in the last boiler being brushed into
the one before it, and so on until the
first boiler is reached, when the con-
fonts again clarified.
Inere are TWO methods OF sugar
making, but both are the same, so
far as we have gone. By the "open
kettle process the syrup is boiled
until it will grain, then drawn off into
low, wooden receivers, called "per-
jurers,' where it is allowed to re-
main until it grains into sugar. 1t is
then placed in hogsheads, and for
twelve days left open, for the mo-
lasses to drip out of it. Then it is
ready for the market or for the refin
er. By this process only yellow
sugar or brown, as some call it, can
| he made.
By the other method considerable
machinery is used. The syrup is
conveyed from the last boiler through
closed pipes to q receiver (the name
has been forgotten), in which are
coils of pipe heated by steam a pow
erful pump exhausts the air, then the
syrup is heated to a very high degree
when the water it contains is rapidly
evaporated and escapes through a
pipe provided for it. By placing a
lamp at one end the sugar-maker can
stand at the opposite end and watch
the progress of the work going on
within. When the syrup reaches a
certain point it is drawn off into vats
to cool. From there it is let down
into ''the centrifugals," of which
there are two in Mr.. Kelly's sugar
house. These are iron. and they re-
mind me as much as anything of iron
wash tubs attached to an upright
axle. Inside the tub is a smaller one
composed of copper netting. In this
the sugar is placed. When it goes
in it is yellow in color, and damp
and heavy with molasses. When ii
comes out it is as white as the best
coffee sugar; the molasses is all eX-
tracted, and the strong taste is re-
placed by the delicious flavor we
all like so well. The tub is set in
motion, and around it goes at the
; rate of twelve hundred revolutions in
, a minute; the molasses is forced ou1
through the wire netting; the sugar
with each turn, gets dryer and whittier
until it reaches the desired shade
2 when it is removed to the hogsheads
I | do not pretend to understand the
4 principle of it. They say velocity
\ does the work. | know, with th,
f molasses all taken out, the sugar Ii
, bound to be whittier. but it looks yer,
9 much as if 1.-The centrifugal gives i
such whirling it gets scared white.
f The working of one plantation diff
e fers very little from all others
s Some are larger, many smaller, thai
n that we visited There they hav
!. about 500 acres in cane, work fifty