The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1883-12-28
THE INDIANA cANE-GRoWERs.

ceSSIty OF modern life as meat or Dread, ana
any means by which its price can be lowered,
quality improved or quantity increased, is of
the greatest interest to the public, Unknown
to the Greeks and Romans except in the form
of honey or nectar the cultivation of the
sugar-cane is of the highest antiquity in
India and China. The Saracens introduced
cultivated in Hayti in 1895, in the Barba-
does in 1916 and by the close of the CEN
fury throughout the West Indies.
The Jesuits brought the cane to the South
ern States in 1894. The first mill was erected
in New Orleans and $4,000 worth of sugar
made in 1894. BY 1903 there were eighty SUI
gar estates in Louisiana making %, 900 hogs
heads. The cane-sugar production of the
world is now over 2,150OO0 tons, OF which
Cuba produces one-third. The price is
largely controlled by the Cuban crop, al
though Brazil, Java, and the Philippine
and Sandwich islands exert their influence
on the price as we'll as the Louisiana prod
uct.
The Chinese sugar-cane was brought to the
United States in 1854 by Major E. H. Flush
ing, now of Tennessee; the seed was
sold as high as ten dollars a pound,
During the war the cultivation of cotton, to-
bacco, and especially of sugar-cene, was
pushed in the Northern States, and in 1866
the production of sorghum sugar was 100000
pounds, and of molasses 100000 gallons.
The product fell off for ten years, but is now
rapidly increasing. This is due in part to
one of those peculiar notifications of a spe-
cies, known to the gardener as sport" and
by which Mr.. Ely Teas. of Indiana, propa-
gated the variety known as the Early Amber,
The notable feature of this kind was that it
granulated, each gallon producing three
pounds of crystalline sugar. Although
sorghum had been raised in China for
4 900 years, the Chinese were not aware of
its sugar-producing qualities until, in 1865,
they were taught the process of granulating
syrups by the United States government
agent.
States amounts to 100000 tons, of which
seven-eighths is imported. The importatons
for 1881 amounted to $88 432, O83, paying $47,-
9S4, 033 duty. The director Of the Mint esti-
mates the gold and silver product for the
same year at SIS, 100000 so that the Tvited
States paid out for saccharines So, sic, 1l6
more than the total, gold and silver
production. 1t would require vessel of
3 500 tons burden, landing at New York
every day of the year, to bring to the United
States its annual sugar importations Besides
the cane-sugar and molasses industry, there
is SIS, 0O0,0 900 invested in the manufacture of
grape-sugar, or glucose, from grain, mainly
Indian corn. This is used in making cheap
candies and syrups, in adulterating cane
sugar syrupa, and in making beer
and alcoholic liquors. From corn
starch is made glucose, and from
this may be made alcohol, By further
fermentation we get acetic acid the base of
vinegar, and by the action of sulphuric acid
on alcohol is made our commonest an es-
thetic sulphuric ether The whole series is
remarkably related and of the highest COM
mercial and economic import. But glucose
has not the sweetening powers Of sucrose, or
cane-sugar, and can never take its place.
The question before the Indiana Cane-grow-
ers' convention is, what are the possibilities
of sorghum, and by what means may
it be brought to state of profit
able and universal cultivation, as
the source of cane-sugar and syrup, through
out the same regions in the United States
in which Indian corn is a paying crop?
The answer is not yet decisive. The Sout h.
ern cane is cultivated not from seed but by
'layering," that is, planting the stalks in the
ground 1t will not grow in the North.
Beet sugar, which was forced on France, as
was the soda manufacture by the Napoleon
failure in the United States,
except in some parts of California.
The sorghum sugar industry has had no
governmental backing, but it is making its
way.
Professors Henry A. Weber and Melville
A. Scovell. of the Champaign Qll) Sugar
Company, claim to make 700 pounds of SUI
gar and 115 gallons of syrup, worth on the
market 81 and 40 cents, or yield of $113
per acre. Few believe that under any cir
cumstances the cane is as profitable as thus
reported That a good article of white
sugar and clear, rich syrup can be made in
Indiana from Chinese sugar-cane at
good profit and by the use of
very simple apparatus is, however, generally
conceded. The discussions of the association
have been Of the greatest interest nractical