The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1919-11-28
MEN, WOMEN
AND THINGS

How many of you remember the days
of your childhood when some play
mate or elder person would slyiy walk
up and tickle you on the kneecap and
ask DO you steal sugar."
Well. it is now getting so scarce
that if it goes up much higher, one
will have to put it in his safety vault,
or some one will come along and take
it. 1t is getting entirely too valuable
to lie around loose.
thought that gone were the days
for good when we would have to be
rationed in our sweets. 1 know of no
grown-up who loves sweets so well
as I do. The war came closer home to
me when I looked in the sugar bowl
than at any other point.
Somehow 1 took it as a personal af-
front every time 1 sat OWN at a cafe
and was handed a little sealed. package
like the one given out containing~one's
weekly dole, to open to find bare
teaspoonful of sugar for my tea cof-
fee or chocolate. But 1 never Judged at
home or in public, for wanted to real
ize in some way some privation.@
1 do not care to boast overmuch, but
it was a test of my patriotism during
the war not to lay in an oversupply
when had the chance, and although
saw the coming of the recent sugar
shortage, 1 did not load up. but played
the result that 1 soon found that In
spite of using it sparingly the supply
had run out
I ran UP to Ashville one Sunday to
preach and good friend in the grocery
business on the Monday morning fol-
lowing was kind enough to say that
as he had enjoyed my sermon he would
let me have four pounds of sugar out
of small quantity which he had put
aside for his own use. few Sundays
afterward I went UP again. but evil
IDENTIFY my preachingswas below par for
nary a bit could 1 coax out of him.
Iwent into a. cafeteria a short while
back and went up to the marble coun-
ter where the sugar bowl was accus-
toned to sit and not seeing anything
which resembled it, l went to the coun-
ter and asked the manager II they
were doing it out, to be told tnat II
was at its usual place. 1 demurred,
abrownish substance which I had tax
en- for a very low grade of molasses
candy.
was at a country hotel not long
ago and the proprietor informed me
that he had quit serving cereals Tor
breakfast as he was short on sugar.
when he brought my coffee he apol-
ogized for not having anything to
sweeten it except Karo, and always be-
ing ready to try any new thing,
poured some of it into my cup and TO
tell the truth it was pretty good
subs titute ] had heard all my llfe
about the old farmer who asked his
| city guest whether he would nave
| 'Iongn or short" sweetening, mean
| ing thereby syrup or sugar.
| Now. impossible as it may SEEM L
saw during the war some of the best
| known business men in Birmingham
| take the lump of sugar on the rim of
their cup and put it in their vest
| pocket to take home with them.
really saw a prominent capitalist al
most in a stew because by mistake ne
had placed his cube in his cup when
he meant to carry it home to his WIFE
to show her that he had had her in
mind while he was banqueting.
| IFS curious. but throughout Europe
| IN through the seventeenth century
| sugar continued to be costly luxury
| an article of medicine only, till the
| increasing use of tea and coffee in the
eighteenth century brought it into the
| list of principal food staples. l sup
pose it was on account of this that Tor
| a long time pills were sugar-coated'
and to this day the medicated candies
are popular with the little ones.
1t is strange how tea slipping and
coffee drinking gave sugar its vogue
| in Europe. Some one said that Eng
| land in fit of Observation-Disclosures had
established an empire; and another
writer on the growth of England's
! colonial policy said that India had
been added to the map of the British
empire because few Englishmen had
made up their minds to get better
and cheaper pot of tea. And having
gotten it of course it was necessary to
| import sugar In this way does the
worlds trade spring up.
| The origin and manufacture of SUI
| gar date back to the remotest an
tiauity, and both remain somewhat in
obscurity. However, the majority OF
Tevidence traces sugarcane to India as
| the home of it's origin. But as l once
remarked it makes no difference how
! far back anything takes it's history
| China must be reckoned WITH and so
George Richardson Porter in his work
entitled THE Nature and Properties OF
Sugarcane" says: 1.-The strongest proofs
! carefully collected from ancient
and modern times lead to the conclu
ksion that China was the first country
in which sXgarcane was cultivated and
| its produce manufactured
| Another author. Prinsen Geerings,
1 Any a &c