Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1884-06-20
SUGAR mi SPICES.

0EUOeIC Il. bangs, III GOlQEn UQu4.
SUGAR AND SPICES.
There is an old question and answer
which many of the young readers of the
Observer have heard. The question is,
"What are little girls made of P" and
the answer Is: "Sugar and spice and
everything nice" 1 shall not repeat the
couplet relating to boys. Imake the
quotation only as an Introduction to a
little talk about some of the common
articles which are always on the break
fast or ~dinner-tab1e. If 1 were to ask
where they all came from you might at
first think it a very easy question to n
swer. You would say that part of them
came from the field and part from the
garden and some from the grocery.
This answer would be correct as far as
it goes; but it would not go far toward
explaining the matter. Indeed, the
wisest man could hardly give q COM
plete answer to the question, for to do
90 he would have to tell how a seed
which has been cast into the ground
and covered deeply under the heavy
soil bursts its covering and sends up a
tender little shoot into the air, there to
grow and spread and blossom and bear
the fruit which came to the table to-day.
Men have found out many curious and
wonderful things in the life history of
plants, but what that life is and how
things grow and blossom none have
ever been able to explain.
So we will not trouble ourselves with
those questions, but will try and answer
some plain ones. Among other things
that you had to-day was sugar. That
came from the store, to be sure, direct
to your home, but if you should ask the
merchant where he obtained it he would
probably answer, at some large ware
house in the great city. And if you
should 60 there and ask the man of
whom he bought it where he found the
sugar he would probably tell you that
it came to him from the refinery. I
have not space to describe to YOU the
whole process by which the dark stuff
that comes to the refinery is changed
into fine white or crushed sugar. How
it is at first dissolved in. tanks of hot
water and then filtered into iron watts
filled with charcoal, which frees itfrom
impurities, after which it is made ready
for market. But il you should still be
inquisitive about the sugar and should
ask the refiner where lie. obtained the
raw material he would be likely to tell
you that it came to him in a ship from
some far-away place, from Louisiana or
the West Indies. In those parts, where
no frosts ever come and no cold winter
winds ever blow, are great plantations
of sugar-cane, a plant which, while
growing, looks something like our In
dian corn, and from which most of our
sugar is made. The sugar-cane may
also be found in other Southern States
and in various parts Of the world where
the climate is hot. The stems of the
cane are long, sometimes ten or twelve
feet high, and nearly filled with a
sweet, juicy pith. At certain seasons
these n are cut and bound together
in bundles and taken to the mill, Where
the canes are passed through heavy iron
rollers that squeeze nearly all the juice
cut of them. The juice then passes into
a reservoir, from which it is drawn into
large vessels and boiled until it becomes
thick by being crystallized. 1t is then
allowed to cool and is put into casks for
shipment to the refineries, of which I
have already spoken.
There are other kinds of sugar besides
that which comes from the sugar-cane.
Some of it is made from the Juice of
beets, some from grapes and some from
the sap of the maple tree. All kinds of
fruit and many other substances have in
them a sweet juice which if pressed out
and redaced to a solid form would be
sugar. The sap Of the sugar-maple,
as any child knows, yields delicious
sugar.
But let us go back to the table again,
and see what we can find out about
such common articles as cloves and cu-
namon and other spices that are used
to make food pleasant to the taste. If
you ask the merchant about these lie
will tell you very much the same story
that he did about the sugar. He will
say they came to him from the great
.storehouse in the city. And if you 90
there again, you will be told that they,
too, came from far away, thousands
and thousands of miles. The best Gin
namon comes from the island of Cey-
Ion, off the southeastern coast of Hin
doostan, in the Indian Ocean. The
cinnamon tree sometimes grows to tie
height of twenty feet. 1t has pretty
flowers of a sllky-gray color. The bark
is taken from the young branches, which
are cut at certain seasons of the year,
and stripped Of their outer coating.
The strips OF bark are exposed to the
hot sun, and in drying are curlcd
up into the little quilts that you
have seen. The finest cloves come
from the Spice Islands, a group in the
Pacific Ocean, between Borneo and New
Guinea, not far from the coast of Asia.
The cloves are the fower-buds of the
Glove tree. which often rows to the