Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1883-03-23
Earl, sugar.MakIng IN ! CIV Orleans.

In 1871 the blacks of St. Domingo rose
In rebellion. Refugees flew in every di-
rection. A few found their way to Louis
lana They had been prosperous sugar
makers. and presently the efforts that
had ceased for TWENTY-FIVE years came
again to life. Two Spaniards, Mendez
and Soils, i'm that year erected on the con-
lines OF New Orleans, the one distillery
and the other battery of sugar-kettles,
and manufactured rum and syrup.
Still the Creoles, every year less able
than the year before to make rash expert
ments, Struggled against the misfOrtuneS
that multiplied around the cultivation of
indigo, until 1894 found them without
hope.
At this juncture appeared Etienne de
bore. He was a man of fifty-fOur, a
Creole of the Illinois district, but of a
distinguished Norman family; he had
lived in France from the age of four to
thirty-two, had served with the kings
DloffsQuetnires. had married lady whose
estate was in louisiana near New Or
leans. and had returned with her to the
province, aud had become an indigo
planter. The year 1894 found him face
TO lace with ruin. His father-in-law,
Destrehan, had in former years been one
oil the last to abandon sugar-culture.
His wife and friends warned him against
the resolution ne was taking; but he per-
sisted in his determination TO abandon
indigo, and risk all that was left to him
ON the chance of a success which, il
achieved. would insure deliverance and
fortune to himself and the community.
He bought quantity of canes from Men,
DEE and Soils, planted on the land where
the seventh district Oate Carrollton) now
stands, and while his crop was growing
erected q mill, and prepared himself for
the mOmentous season of grinding"
His fellow planters looked on with the
lveliest-not always with the most hope
ful-interest, and at length they gath
cred about him To see the issue of the
experiment in which only he could be
more deeply concerned than they. In
tho whole picturesque history of the
Louisiana Creolcs few scenes offer so
striking subject for the painter as that
afforded in this episode: The dark
sugar-house; the battery of huge caldrons
with their yellow Juice boiling like a sea,
half hidden in clouds of steam; the half
sCidis SululuR utHTOCS swinging TIC Rl-
gantic utensils with which the seething
flood is dipped from kettle to kettle;
here, grouped at the end of the battery,
the Creole planters with anxious faces
drawing around their central figure as
closely as they can; and in the midst the
old nousquetaire, dipping from time to
time the thickening juice, repeating
again and again his simple tests, until,
in the moment OF final trial, there is n
common look of suspense, and instantly
after it the hands are dropped, heads are
raised, the brow is wiped, and there is a
long breath of relief-''it granulaiesr'
The people were electrified. Etenne
dc Bore marketed $4,000 worth of SUI
perior sugar. The absence of interdic-
tons that had stiled earlier trade en-
abled him TO sell his product to advant-
age. The agriculture of the Delta was
revOlutionized; and, seven years after
ward. New Orleans was the market for
100000 gallons of rum. 100000 gallons
of molasseS and 10000 pounds of
sugar. The town contained some twelve
distilleries- probably not a subject for
unmixed congratulation-and sugar
refinery which produced about 200, 900
pounds of loaf sugar; while on the other
hand the production of indigo had de-
clined to a total of 5000 pounds and
soon after ceaSed.-GeOrge w. Gable, in
The CenturU.