COMMON COMMODITIES

ND INDUSTRIES

UC-NRLF

SUGAR

Common Commodities and
Industries Series

Each book in crown 8vo, cloth, with many
illustrations, charts, etc. 2s. net.

Tea : Prom Grower to Consumer. By A. Ibbetson.
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Sugar : Cane and Beet. By Geo. Martineau, C.B.
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By R. J. Peake.
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Photo by N. P. Edwards, Littlehampton

SANTA CRUZ — A FIELD OF SUGAR CANE

PITMAN'S COMMON COMMODITIES
AND INDUSTRIES

SUGAR

CANE AND BEET

AN OBJECT LESSON
BY

GEORGE MARTINEAU, C.B,

Secretary to the British Sugar Refiners' Committee, 1872-92.

Adviser to the British Delegates at the International

Conferences of 1875-6-7, 1888, 1898, and 1901-2.

Assistant British Delegate on the Permanent

International Sugar Commission at

Brussels, 1903-5

LONDON

SIR ISAAC PITMAN & SONS, LTD., 1 AMEN CORNER, E.C.4
AND AT BATH, NEW YORK AND MELBOURNE

First Edition, February, 1910.
Second Edition, November, 1910.
Third Edition, August, 1914.
Fourth Edition, February, 1918.

PRINTED BY SIR ISAAC PITMAN
& SONS, LTD., LONDON, BATH,
NEW YORK AND MELBOURNE

Preface to the Fourth Edition

THE statistics have been brought up to date, and so
have the brief accounts of the various producing coun-
tries. The technical progress of the industry has
consisted chiefly in the increased size of the factories
and machinery. Improvements in the construction and
use of the machinery continue to be evolved as time
goes on, but do not develop anything sufficiently new
to call for special notice in this elementary treatise.
The only strikingly new feature is the extension of the
system of producing white sugar direct from the cane
juice and the perfecting of its methods. By white
sugar is here meant fine, dry grocery sugar of the
highest quality and whiteness, which will keep for
any length of time without deteriorating. No cane
sugar factory can produce such sugar without per-
fection in the arrangement of the necessary machinery,
great skill and care on the part of the managers
and workmen, and the carrying out of the process
by methods recognized as most successful. This
was comparatively easy in the case of the beetroot
sugar industry; with cane juice greater care and skill are
absolutely essential. It remains to be seen how far
tropical management and labour will succeed in this
new undertaking.

Several new books of very high class have appeared
since the first edition of this little handbook. " The
World's Cane Sugar Industry : Past and Present," by
Dr. H. C. Prinsen Geerligs, published by Norman Rodger,
2 St. Dunstan's Hill, E.C., should be read by every one

VI PREFACE

who wants to know all about the history of sugar, with-
out being troubled with its technicalities. Those who
desire the technicalities, most interesting and essential
to the expert, must read the latest edition (1911) of
Noel Deerr's " Cane Sugar," from the same publisher,
who has also published " Practical White Sugar Manu-
facture " (1915), and " Chemical Control in Cane Sugar
Factories " (1917), both by Dr. H. C. Prinsen Geerligs.
Another book from the same publisher deals again with
" Plantation White Sugar and its Manufacture," by
Harloff and Schmidt, translated from the second revised
Dutch edition by James P. Ogilvie, F.C.S., Technical
Editor of the International Sugar Journal. A new book
has recently appeared from the United States, " Some-
thing About Sugar," by George M. Rolph, a handsome
volume, well illustrated, giving first a full account of
production and refining, and then a history of the
industry.

The diagram in the Appendix is merely intended to
indicate that variation in visible supplies is the cause
of variations in price. It is not put there for statistical
purposes, but it does, incidentally, illustrate what
happened at a very critical period in the history of sugar,
namely, that the abolition of the bounties, in 1903, had
no effect on the price of sugar, which remained rather
below the cost of production, except when, in 1904, a
bad beetroot crop, which deprived consumers of
1,200,000 tons of sugar, sent prices up for a few months,
until a good crop, in 1905, sent them down again below
cost of production.

Preface to the First Edition

THE publishers have asked me to write a little book on
Sugar. I take this to mean a popular book which shall
attract the reader by being, if possible, interesting as
well as instructive, and that where technical detail is
necessary it shall not be too " dry."

But for those whom I may succeed in interesting,
and who may desire to know more and go deeper, I can
recommend a few books of a reliable character. One
of the greatest sugar experts of the present day is H. C.
Prinsen Geerligs, x who has been doing splendid work in
Java for many years. He wrote a little book in 1902,
published at the office of The Sugar Cane, Altrin-
cham, on " Cane Sugar and the Process of its Manu-
facture in Java," which is easy to read and well worth
reading. This was followed by a larger work in 1909,
published by Norman Rodger at the same office, entitled
" Cane Sugar and its Manufacture." It does what it
professes, giving in one book all that is known of the
chemistry and technology of the sugar cane and cane
sugar manufacture. The technicalities relating to
machinery it leaves to others, especially to Noel Deerr's
work, " Sugar and the Sugar Cane." This book, a very
excellent one, published in the same office, appeared
in 1905. The most recent work, published by Edward
Stanford in 1909, " The Manufacture of Cane Sugar,"
by Llewellyn Jones, M.I.E.S., and Frederic I. Scard,
F.I.C., is also a fine work, profusely illustrated. A new
edition, published by Spon, 1909, has recently appeared,
of Newlands' portly and expensive volume, " Sugar: a
Handbook for Planters and Refiners," bringing things

1 Now Dr. H. C. Prinsen Geerligs.

Vlll PREFACE

up to date. I hasten to express my acknowledgments
to all these authors. 1

The Sugar Cane, now called The International
Sugar Journal, published at Altrincham, 2 is the best
English vade-mecum for technical matters and general
news connected with sugar. The West India Committee
Circular is also well worth reading, full of interesting
news and good pictures. The Journal des Fabricants de
Sucre, the Paris organ of the French industry, has been
one of my constant companions ever since its birth
in 1860. It is a mine of accurate information on all
matters connected with the world's sugar industry.
From America we get the Louisiana Planter, the
A merican Sugar Industry and Beet Sugar Gazette, 3
Willett and Gray's Weekly Statistical Sugar Trade
Journal, and other useful guides to knowledge. There
are also German and Austrian sugar journals of a first-
class character for those who can read the language.
The inquiring student, when he has read and digested
the larger works which I have mentioned, can therefore
keep up his knowledge from week to week by reading
the journals of the day. If this little popular treatise
succeeds in impelling him to further study I shall not
have laboured in vain.

1 The following are exhaustive treatises on the beetroot
sugar industry : " Beet-Sugar Manufacture," by Lewis S. Ware ;
2 vols., New York, 1905. " Treatise on the Manufacture of
Beetroot Sugar," by Paul Horsin-Deon, revised and enlarged by
Georges Horsin-Deon ; third edition, 2 vols., Paris, 1912.
" Treatise on the Manufacture of Beetroot Sugar," by Manoury,
Paris.

8 Now 2 St. Dunstan's Hill, London, E.G.

3 Now Sugar.

CONTENTS

CHAP.

PAGE

PREFACE TO FOURTH EDITION ... V

PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION . . . vii

I. A RETROSPECT . . . 1

II. CANE AND BEET . . 13

III. CANE JUICE ... 26

IV. BEET JUICE ... .38
V. CLARIFICATION . .50

VI. CRYSTALLIZATION ..... 64

VII. SUGAR REFINING . .80

VIII. THE CANE INDUSTRY . .89

IX. THE BEET INDUSTRY . . 104

X. COMPETITION ... .117

XI. DIPLOMACY .... .126

XII. THE SUGAR MARKET . . • 137

APPENDIX TO FIRST EDITION . . 145

APPENDIX TO FOURTH EDITION . .148

INDEX .... 159

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

THE SUGAR CANE Frontispiece

facing
Page

PENANG BARGES LOADED WITH CUT SUGAR CANES 4

REAPING SUGAR CANES IN THE WEST INDIES . . 10

THE SUGAR CANE ....... 14

BEETROOTS ........ 18

LABORATORY FOR TESTING BEETROOTS FOR SEED-
SELECTION PURPOSES ..... 22

JAVA A MODERN SUGAR-CANE MILL ... 28

CRUSHING SHOWING RIPE CANES IN CANE-CARRIERS 32

UNLOADING A CARGO OF BEETROOTS . . . 40

TRANSPORTING BEETROOTS TO THE FACTORY BY

ELECTRIC TRAIN ...... 42

JAVA SUGAR FACTORY ..... 52

VACUUM PANS ....... 56

JAVA DIGGING OUT A CANAL TO PROVIDE A

PLANTATION WITH WATER ..... 62

A ROW OF CENTRIFUGAL MACHINES ... 72

CARRYING THE CANES TO THE FACTORY IN MEXICO 82

CARTING SUGAR CANES ...... 96

QUEENSLAND CARRYING CUT CANES TO THE FACTORY 110

ISIS CENTRAL SUGAR MILL 128

UNLOADING SUGAR CANES AT THE FACTORY .' . 138

CHART SHOWING FLUCTUATION IN PRICES . end of book
MAP SHOWING SUGAR-PRODUCING COUNTRIES

XI

SUGAR

CHAPTER I

A -RETROSPECT

A POPULAR book about sugar can, perhaps, be made
interesting as well as instructive. The dry details of
growth, manufacture, distribution and consumption
may here and there be flavoured, illustrated and devel-
oped by a few historical facts. To begin with, a retro-
spective glance at what sugar was in this country sixty
years ago compared with what it is now will best enable
the reader to realize at the outset the extraordinary
development of the world's sugar industries since the
middle of the last century — development not merely in
the technical details connected with production and
manufacture but also in the much more interesting,
because more human, process of keen competition
between the various and constantly changing sources of
production. This will lead up to a yet higher kind of
interest when 'we come to examine to what extent and
in what manner the Governments of various sugar-
producing States have stimulated production and
influenced, for good or for evil, the natural course of
supply and demand. Here will arise many fascinating
questions of international relations, political contro-
versies, and the conflict of economic facts with economic
theories.

Thus it will be seen, at the end of the story, that the

1

2«' '; ' t<; ('< \ \.' SUGAR

subject of sugar is not only a technical one of the highest
importance both from the practical and the scientific
point of view, but also has an international, economic
and political side which furnishes a unique and striking
object lesson for those who take an intelligent and
inquiring interest in the economic questions of the day.
But rightly to learn this lesson the reader must bring
to the study an open mind, unwarped by preconceived
notions founded on theoretical dogmas unsupported
by the practical experience of actual work and daily
experiment. In natural science it is necessary to begin
in the laboratory in order to arrive at the facts on which
to construct theories. In economic science this process
is equally necessary, but unfortunately is seldom fol-
lowed. The history of sugar will show that the practical
experience of that great laboratory called industry does
not always bear out the conclusions to which learned
professors may arrive in the comfortable repose of their
armchairs.

To begin at the beginning, let us cast a retrospective
glance at sugar in this country sixty years ago, just before
great changes began, and first of all to London, at that
time the largest centre of importation. The actual
figures of proportional imports were, in 1860 : London,
50 per cent. ; the Clyde, 17 per cent. ; Liverpool, 15
per cent. ; Bristol, 10 per cent. ; other ports, 8 per cent.
In the year 1900 the figures, in round numbers, were :
London, 11 per cent. ; Liverpool, 15 per cent. ; the
Clyde, 7 per cent. ; Bristol, 4 per cent. ; other ports —
entirely foreign refined sugar — 63 per cent. The
imports in 1860 were practically all raw sugar ; we made
all the refined sugar consumed here. In 1900 the
imports were, in London, Liverpool, the Clyde and
Bristol, raw sugar for refining coupled with a certain
proportion of foreign refined sugar. In all the other

A RETROSPECT 3

ports — 63 per cent, of the total — they consisted entirely
of foreign refined sugar. In 1860 the total imports
into the United Kingdom were : raw sugar, 434,766
tons ; refined sugar, 13,303 tons. In 1900 they were :
raw sugar, 661,747 tons ; foreign refined sugar, 962,409
tons. These are eloquent figures and we shall see how
the change came about.

In 1860 our supplies of sugar came mainly from our
own sugar-producing colonies in the West Indies,
Mauritius and India. The Spanish West Indies, Brazil
and Manilla were our other principal sources of supply.
At that time practically all the refined sugar consumed
in this country was the product of our own refineries.
Sugar refining was, in those days, a most important
British industry, and London was its principal centre.
In London was produced nearly all the loaf sugar that
the country consumed. The London refiners were men
of some importance in the City. Their " sugar houses "
were to be found in the East End in considerable num-
bers and constituted the staple industry of the district.
From Whitechapel eastward to Mile End, and southward
through St. George's-in-the-East to the gates of the
London Docks, their chimneys were to be seen on all
hands. The London Docks and the East and West
India Docks were full of raw sugar destined for these
various refineries. A refinery in those days was con-
sidered to be a good-sized one if it dealt with three or
four hundred tons of raw sugar in a week. This may
sound ridiculous to the reader of the present day, but he
must recollect that the consumption of sugar only
amounted then to about 34 Ibs. per head of the popula-
tion. It must also be remembered that in those days,
from the time the raw sugar entered the refinery until it
left it in the form of loaf sugar, at least a month elapsed.

Some of the London loaf sugar producers were at

4 SUGAR

that time very much in the habit of working almost
entirely the raw sugar that came from the island of
Jamaica. Our West India Islands made only what is
called muscovado sugar, the nature of which will be
explained when we come to the subject of sugar pro-
duction. The muscovado sugar from Jamaica was very
superior to that from most of the other islands, and was
much sought after by the more fastidious of the London
refiners. But, of course, the time came, as consumption
increased, when the refiner had to add some of the inferior
qualities and to maintain his average by using higher
grades of raw sugar from Havana or Mauritius, and
subsequently, when the Dutch monopoly of the Java
crop ceased, the fine qualities from that favoured
island.

In the streets of the East End could be seen, at all
hours of the day, great wagons, drawn by the finest
specimens of the cart-horse breed, each containing six
hogsheads — about five tons — of British West Indian sugar
destined for one or another of the twenty flourishing
refineries of the district. A visitor to those busy streets,
if he followed one of these wagons, would find himself
opposite a large factory, a hive of bustling industry.
On one side of it would be a row of similar wagons, their
freight of raw sugar being hoisted to the top floor of a
lofty building where the refining process began. On
the opposite side of the works he would find a much
longer line of smaller wagons or carts taking delivery of
the refined sugar to go to the consumer. Such was the
life of the East End in those days. To-day it is called
" The Workless City."

The London refiner made five products : loaf sugar,
white crushed sugar, yellow crushed sugar, and a small
quantity of very brown sugar, from which followed the
final product — treacle. Even this treacle was a nice

West
Indies

East
Indies

Mauritius

Foreign

Total

Tons

Tons

Tons

Tons

Tons

21,483

588

12,045

14,443

48,559

25,962

2,394

10,192

36,539

75,087

30,645

1,000

9,032

95,863

136,540

6 SUGAR

sweet food in those days, with a pleasant flavour and
aroma of good West Indian sugar.

Passing to. Scotland, the next largest seat of the
industry, there were at Greenock, in 1860, about thirteen
refineries, to which must be added four in Glasgow and
one in Leith. Many of the Greenock houses were very
flourishing and constantly improving their manufacture.
The wonderful increase in the raw sugar consumed in
the Clyde refineries in the middle of the last century has
been stated as follows :

Year

1854 ..
1860 ..
1865 ..

In the following year, 1866, the total was 162,368 tons.

These figures sufficiently indicate the go-ahead nature
of the industry in Scotland at that period. They made
no loaf sugar, but supplied the northern (and even the
southern) markets with what they wanted, white
crystals and white and yellow " crushed " sugars.

Two vital improvements in the art of sugar refining —
improvements which created a complete revolution in the
industry and in the style of sugar produced — took place
during the period indicated in the above figures, and
fully accounted for the boom in sugar refining on the
Clyde. The first was the adoption of the centrifugal
machine, by which the sugar in the boiled crystalline
mass is separated from the syrup in a few minutes. The
second was the boiling of yellow sugars at a low tem-
perature, causing the sugar to be turned out in a
uniformly moist state, and with a pale and delicate
primrose tinge instead of a dull dark yellow colour.
The firm who discovered and perfected this latter

A RETROSPECT 7

process made a large fortune in less than seven years,
and immediately built a big refinery on the banks of
the Thames. Here was a striking instance of the often
disregarded maxim, that if you want, in industry, to
profit from a new invention you must do it at once.

But the importance of the fact in this particular
chapter is that it greatly conduced to the remarkable
progress of the industry on the Clyde. The increase
already stated was sufficiently striking, but the success
continued for twenty years. The yearly average for
the five years 1877-81 was 248,429 tons, and for 1882-86
240,852 tons. Then came a terrible relapse. The
quinquennial yearly averages which followed have
been :

1887-91 228,733 tons

1892-96 170,373 „

1897-1900 124,874 „

Thus we see that the first spurt from 75,000 tons
in 1860 to 136,000 tons in 1865 reached to 240,000 tons
in 1882-86, and then fell away until the average for
1897-1900 is only 125,000 tons, a figure actually lower
than that of the first burst more than thirty-five years
before. 1 This is almost incredible. Consumption in
the United Kingdom had gone up by leaps and bounds,
the Greenock refiners had constantly improved their
manufacture, their sugar was as popular as ever, and
they could certainly work as cheaply as any refiners
in the world.

1 This lamentable fall in the Greenock sugar refining industry
was entirely the result of the new European bounty-fed com-
petition. British markets, and every small port on the coast,
were flooded with foreign refined sugar, sold frequently at prices
below the cost of production, Since the abolition of the bounties
by the Brussels Convention, in 1903, the industry has recovered
and now flourishes, as will be seen by the figures given in the
Appendix IX.

8 SUGAR

Let us pass to the next centre of the sugar refining
industry, Liverpool. Here are to be found, even now,
some of the oldest names in the trade. Two were
well known in the Clyde in the early" part of last century.
In 1860 there were nine refineries on the Mersey and
two at Manchester. They were, like their brethren
in London, men of considerable substance and position
in the city of Liverpool, and took a leading part in
public affairs. Their raw material came largely from
Brazil, Liverpool being the principal goal for ships
from that country. They were, therefore, accustomed
to work a rather low class of raw material, and conse-
quently turned out a considerable proportion of yellow
sugar. There was one exception to this at a later
period ; another instance of success in seizing on a
new invention rapidly, fearlessly and on a large scale.
There again a large fortune was made in a very few
years, and was immediately followed by the erection
of a monster refinery on the banks • of the Thames,
which has flourished greatly ever since, a notable
instance of the survival of the fittest. But that does
not concern us at the moment. Golden syrup was a
speciality at Liverpool, but has now been superseded by
a superior article ; again, another instance of inventive
genius coupled with bold, unhesitating action.

At present there are only three sugar refineries,
properly so called, in Liverpool or its neighbourhood,
but there are several refineries of sugar for brewing
purposes.

Bristol is the fourth sugar refining centre, and
historically the most interesting. In the eighteenth
century, Bristol was largely engaged in trade with
the British West Indies. There were nearly a hundred
firms in the sugar trade, and about twenty refineries
in operation. Many of the inhabitants of the town

A RETROSPECT 9

were owners of West Indian estates, and importers of
sugar. Even as late as 1811 sixteen refineries were
at work. But when, shortly afterwards, the vacuum
pan superseded the older processes the industry became
concentrated in fewer hands and, in 1848, the number
had been reduced to five. In 1863 only two remained,
afterwards increased to three.

One of these, an old-established firm, was for
many years a leading feature of the Bristol sugar re-
fining industry, and carried on the work on a larger
scale than any of its competitors in England or Scotland.
It was the first to adopt the centrifugal machine on a
large scale, and to turn out large-grained crystallized
sugar. Of this trade it had for many years almost a
monopoly, and a well-deserved celebrity. The family
of Finzel were quite the sugar kings of that day, and
were as celebrated for their munificent charities as for
their fine sugar, of which they turned out more than a
thousand tons a week. But, alas, this most successful
firm, and their large fortune, disappeared, squeezed
out by foreign competition, and by newer schemes
and discoveries. The West India sugar, which was
the original basis of the Bristol industry, disappeared
from the market, and Bristol refiners had to seek their
raw material in other and less convenient quarters.

Our brief retrospect of sixty years comes to this.
At the beginning of the period we made all our own
refined sugar for home consumption. At the end of
it we import nearly a million tons of foreign refined,
but still manage to produce about 700,000 tons at home.
Big refineries have taken the place of small ones. In
London, where there were twenty, there are now two,
both on the banks of the Thames. But there are also
two large refineries and one or two small ones where
sugar is refined for the use of brewers.

10 SUGAR

As to refineries on the Thames, a few words may be
not altogether out of place. The first monster building
to appear there was built, as has bsen already stated,
about the year 1864 by the Greenock firm who made
a rapid fortune by quick and extensive adoption of a
new process. The London house was carried on by
James Duncan, one of the partners. He was the prince
of sugar refiners in his time, and never ceased to keep
himself informed of all that was going on in the great
beetroot sugar industry of Europe. His enterprise
was unbounded, and his success undisputed. The
whole region round about the Victoria Docks banefited,
not only from the great industry which he established
in its midst, but also from his constant munificent,
though silent, assistance to ah1 good works in the district.
Though he had a beautiful estate on the banks of the
Clyde, he was never an idle man. Always at work,
always thinking out some new scheme, he soon
distanced his competitors. But when the crisis of 1884
arrived, with all its disasters, he had a hard struggle
and, in 1886, his great works at Clyde wharf, Victoria
Docks, were closed. At one time he is said to have4
turned out two thousand tons a week. He lived for
many years in happy retirement. He was for years
Chairman of the British Sugar Refiners' Committee
during their long fight against unfair foreign competition.

Then came another man, the late Sir Henry Tate,
who made a rapid fortune by quick and bold adoption
of a new process. While others talked he acted. He
was lucky in one respect. He came to London in 1877
to make loaf (cube) sugar, just at the moment when
the French Government, goaded by our persistent
exposure of the vast profits made by Paris refiners
out of the sugar duty, at last abolished the questionable
practices and set matters on a more even footing.

12 SUGAR

In Scotland, where there were eighteen refineries,
there are now five, with one for brewers' sugar. Lan-
cashire, which had eleven refineries in 1860, now has
three, together with several makers of brewers' sugar.
Bristol is now a blank.

These great changes are the result of many causes,
some natural and inevitable, others artificial, injurious
both to our industries and to our consumers, and not
only much to be deprecated but also, curiously enough,
easy to overcome. And yet they were permitted,
for more than thirty years, to create such a disturbance
of the natural course of production throughout the
world, that it will take some years to restore matters
to their normal state. The history of this part of our
subject will come at a later stage, and we must now
plunge into the more technical details of sugar
production.

CHAPTER II

CANE AND BEET

IMAGINE a great thicket of sugar cane in the full vigour
of growth before it is ripe. Stems six to twelve — even
to twenty — feet high, clothed from foot to head with
great tropical leaves, and crowned at the top with a
final wide-spreading bunch of the same. Imagine
the field again when the canes are ripe. Except the
bunch at the top the leaves are gone. The slender
elegant cane, of various hues, curves up to the sky,
shining in its waxen skin, variegated with rings at regular
intervals where the lost leaves had sprung out, and
where still nestles the bud or germ which under wild
conditions would, when the cane falls exhausted, throw
out roots and spring into a new cane. From the bunch
of leaves at the top has now shot out a long slender
arrow with silky grey tassels of feathery flower at the
end of it. The cane is ripe, and full of good sugar juice
nearly up to the top. It is cut down, the top joints
removed, and the rest of the cane piled up on wagons
to go with all speed to the factory. No time must be
lost, for the sugar begins to deteriorate with great
rapidity.

In the good old days, when fortunes were made out
of sugar without much trouble, there was plenty of
loss before the cane got to the mill, and plenty more
after it got there. But now all this is changed. There
is little hope of making a decent living unless everything
is done in the best way ; and this " best way " it has
taken many long years and much science, skill and
perseverance to discover and carry out. The Indian

13

14 SUGAR

native, the Chinaman in Formosa, or the inhabitants
of the Philippine Islands may still be squeezing out
the juice with primitive rollers, boiling it in iron pots
till it solidifies, and then selling it for what it will fetch,
but this is not sufficient to supply the world with eight
million tons of cane sugar every year. The growing
of the cane and the making of the sugar have now be-
come industries of the very highest scientific perfection.
Accurate chemical knowledge of the constituents of the
cane, of the constituents of the soil where it happens
to be growing and, consequently, of the nature of the
manures necessary to maintain in the soil the various
foods required for the healthy growth of the plant, are
the first requisites for the successful cane farmer. He
must also know which particular kind of cane— for
there are many — is most likely to flourish in his soil
and climate. As to cultivation, the ordinary rules for
good ploughing, good drainage, and careful hoeing
during the early growth, are just as imperative in the
tropics as in the European fields of sugar beet or any
other crop.

The sugar cane is planted, not sown. A bit of cane,
long enough to include two or three of the rings, is
laid lengthways, or stuck in in a slanting direction,
along a furrow running the length of the field, or in
holes dug at regular intervals. When the trench is
planted the pieces of cane are lightly covered with
earth. In a few weeks they show growth above ground.
The germ-bud at the ring has begun to shoot out into
young cane, and the ring at the same time has thrown
out rootlets into the soil. The parallel trenches must
leave room between them to enable the labourers,
when the wide-spreading canes, double the height of
a man; are getting ripe, to reach between the rows
and remove the dying leaves which cumber the ripening

By p;rmiss'jn of the Queensland Government

THE SUGAR CANE

16 SUGAR

cane. The falling leaves take with them much valuable
food to return to the soil, and the naked cane has better
opportunity for good ripening.

This ripening of the cane is a very ticklish matter.
If the cane is cut before it is quite ripe some of the
sugar which it contains is not in a crystallizable state.
On the other hand, if the cane gets too ripe some of its
crystallizable sugar goes back into the uncrystallizable
state. This must often be a sad trouble to the manager
of an estate and factory. Again, if the central factory
is supplied with canes from a multitude of small
farmers they may be all wanting to send their canes in
at one time. To the factory this is an impossible
situation. The manager must, consequently, be con-
tent to have canes which are not always at the exact
point of ripeness which might be desired.

The growth of the cane, lasting about 15 to 18 months
is an interesting study. When it is at maturity the
rind is of a very strong consistency, and is protected
on the outside by a waxen covering. The inside of
the cane consists of the cells containing the sugar juice,
and of long bundles of fibres which convey from the
ground the water and food necessary for helping to carry
on the process of development. These fibres call at
each ring of the cane in order to deliver the particular
food required for the growth of the leaf, and the sus-
tenance of the germ-bud. To the top of the cane they
bring those things which are necessary for the growth
of the cane, the arrow and the flower. The leaves
in their turn do a most important work. While the
internal fibres are bringing food and water from the
ground, the leaves, helped by the sunshine, are collecting
carbonic acid from the air, and it is the carbon thus
consumed by the plant which, combining with the water
from below, forms the substance which we call sugar.

CANE AND BEET 17

It is the same with the sugar-beet, that little modest
plant of northern climes, with its small bunch of leaves
close to the ground, spreading out like a toy parasol
to keep the ground moist underneath, and to suck in
the rays of sunshine from above. It is a little bulging
root, tapering to a slender tap-root which thrusts its
way far down to find water and food, while the leaves
and the sunshine make the sugar. It is curious to
think that this humble root, weighing only two pounds,
at one time gave to the world as much sugar every
year as the lordly sugar cane, and that the beetroot
factory should actually extract a greater percentage
of sugar from the little root than the cane factory wins
from the rich cane. But it must not be forgotten that,
under favourable circumstances, the cane can produce
twice as much sugar to the acre as the beetroot. Which
will win the race ?

Up to 1903 the beetroot had the great artificial
stimulus and assistance of paternal Governments.
In some places the cane is now beginning to receive
something of the same kind. The United States gives
preferential treatment to Cuban sugar, and Cuba
consequently goes ahead by leaps and bounds. But
the United States does more than this. It admits
its own sugar, from the cane fields of Louisiana and
the beet fields of the Northern States, free of duty.
Those industries therefore nourish. It also admits,
free of duty, the cane sugar from Porto Rico, the
Sandwich Islands and, recently, the Philippines. The
two former have consequently doubled and trebled their
production. It remains to be seen what the slow
moving inhabitants of the Philippines will do. Japan
has also come into the field as a paternal Government.
Their newly-acquired island of Formosa has always
produced sugar in the Chinese way. Bad canes badly

18 SUGAR

cultivated and crushed in stone mills driven by buffaloes,
have produced a rough, dirty, nearly black sugar, and
the Chinaman has been satisfied. He gets less than
half the juice from the cane, and half the sugar from the
juice. But Japan means to substitute for this state
of things a first-class sugar industry, and has set about
it, as usual with the Japanese, in a business-like way.
They began by learning their lesson and finding out
how sugar is grown and how it is made in the very
best factories, whether tropical or European. They
then told the people in Formosa how they should grow
their canes, what canes they should plant, and what
manure they should use. They told them, further,
that central factories would be established which would
buy the improved canes from the farmers at a much
better price than what they got out of their whole
process of growing and sugar-making. It took some
time to move the naturally conservative ideas of the
native producer, but they are succeeding. Factories
are being erected and the growers are beginning to fall
in with the new ideas. If success comes it means that
in a few years Japan will make sugar enough to supply
the Japanese consumer with all the sugar he wants ;
and as the sugar receives preferential treatment in
Japan, and therefore fetches a high price, there will be a
great stimulus to Formosan production, and the final
result may very likely be that Japan will become an
exporter of refined sugar. In 1901-2 Formosan exports
to Japan were 46,893 tons; in 1910-11 256,950 tons.
The crop in 1916-17 is estimated at 338,997 tons.

The methods of growing cane sugar vary in different
countries. In our West Indian colonies the first planting
may give an average yield of thirty tons of canes to the
acre. This is called the plant-cane crop. The " stool "
left when the canes are cut down will, if permitted,

BEETROOTS

20 SUGAR

throw out another but inferior crop of canes. This
is called the " ratoon " crop, and may amount to
about twenty tons of canes to the acre. In the West
Indies, and in other parts, several ratoon crops are
sometimes grown ; but in countries like Java, where
labour is plentiful and cheap, the crop is freshly planted
every year. In Java, sugar is, in fact, a rotation crop,
other crops being grown in alternate years. This is
a governmental regulation which must be observed.
This system, coupled with great perfection in cultivation
and manufacture, has had the result of realizing, as
the average crop for the whole of Java, the almost
incredible quantity of more than four tons of sugar
to the acre. This means that many of the best estates
and factories turn out at least five tons to the acre,
a truly marvellous performance when we recollect
what was considered a good yield in the West Indies
fifty years ago. Two hogsheads of muscovado sugar
to the acre was considered in those days a thing to boast
about. As a hogshead weighed from sixteen to eighteen
hundredweight this was only a yield of a ton and a
half to the acre, about the average yield of the European
beetroot.

There is another important variation in the agri-
cultural system of different cane sugar countries. The
sugar cane must have water, if it is to grow properly
and give its customary yield. Very often it gets too
much water and, therefore, good drainage is essential.
In British Guiana, where the cane fields lie below the
level of the sea, the superfluity of water has some-
times to be pumped off the land. But, on the other
hand, there is often a terrible spell of dry, hot weather,
and then water has to be pumped on to the land. Many
countries have to grow their canes almost entirely by
irrigation. Peru is the most remarkable case, for in

CANE AND BEET 21

that country there is practically no rain. Fortunately
there are splendid means for easy and effectual irrigation.
Where this is the case some of the heaviest crops in the
world are produced under a system of thoroughly
scientific irrigation. In the Sandwich Islands, for
instance, it is known, and has been recorded, that crops
of more than fifty tons of cane to the acre have been
produced. Here we have the wonderful crops of Java
easily eclipsed.

There is one more detail about the sugar cane which
must be noted. The wild cane produces seed, but the
cultivated variety has become so accustomed to growing
from cuttings that it has, as a rule, forgotten how to
produce seed. It has been discovered recently that
seed can be found, and that it will produce canes.
These seedling canes come up in very various qualities,
some perhaps better than the existing kinds. Men
of science have set to work to select from these seedlings
and endeavour to produce a cane that will possess a
maximum of good qualities, each selection to be the
one most suitable to a particular soil and climate and,
especially, to be the most powerful in resisting disease.
The growers of cane sugar have thus at last found an
opportunity of following the example of the beetroot
industry.

In the European beetroot countries the process of
selection has been going on for generations. The
roots used to yield five to six per cent, of sugar ; now
they yield thirteen to fifteen per cent. In 1908, a very
exceptional season, the average yield for the whole of
Germany was nearly seventeen per cent., and for
Bohemia even more. This is a truly wonderful advance,
entirely thanks to the producers of beetroot seed. By
constantly selecting the richest roots for planting in
their seed nurseries they have gradually advanced year

22 SUGAR

by year to this pitch of perfection. The beetroot flowers
and seeds in its second year, so there is every opportunity
for this process of selection.

The beetroot plant is sown as early as possible, but
not so soon as to run the risk of late frosts. The ground
is prepared in the most thorough and scientific way
because the crop, to be successful, must have clean
land, well broken up, and in good heart as to the right
kind of richness. To keep it clean during the growth
of the young plant you may see, on a first-class farm
in Germany or Austria, a band of labourers hoeing
between the faint green lines of the baby plant long
before weeds are visible. This is the real way to stop
weeds. The germs are turned up and left to die in the
hot sun of May and June. If the crop has a nice moist
spring, plenty of sunshine in the summer, and a good
long autumn, it will be a good one. A dry spring,
wet summer, and short, cold autumn, will give a short
crop. But, worst of all is drought all through spring
and summer, such as they had in 1904. That means a
deficiency of more than a million tons of sugar in the
European beetroot crop. We want great increases
in the cane crops of the world to defend us against
such disasters in the future.

The roots begin to be ready for the harvest in late
September and early October, and they are all gathered
in by the middle of November. Those that do not
go direct to the factory, have to be pitted till the factory
is ready for them. The pit is constructed in a scientific
way, with proper ventilation, and a good covering.
But the factories are so big now that they make short
work of it, and have generally finished with their roots
by the end of the year. The delivery of the roots to
the factory was at one time a sad source of disputes
and friction, but habit has pretty well overcome this

24 SUGAR

difficulty. The farmers and the factory now understand
each other better. The farmer is bound by contract
to use the best seed, and the right kinds of manure,
and to deliver the roots clean and well trimmed. If
Germany in a good year can make an average yield of
nearly seventeen per cent, of sugar, it is certain that
nothing but first-class roots have been delivered. The
weight of roots to the acre varies in different countries.
Germany averages between ten and fourteen tons,
Austria much less. Russia cannot get beyond six to
seven tons.

The cane crop fortunately takes place at very various
times in different quarters of the tropical regions, and
thus does not flood the markets of the world with all
its sugar at once. But Cuba, stimulated by the United
States' preference, now makes 3,000,000 tons of sugar,
and as it naturally sent its sugar to the market where
at one time it enjoyed a preference of about Is. 6d.
per cwt., the American markets were flooded with
Cuban sugar during the crop season. This led to the
curious and abnormal fact that in the early months of
the year the price of sugar in America was often Is. 6d.
per cwt., and even more, below what is called the
world's price. The preference has now been reduced
to Is. 2d.

It may be interesting to note the dates at which the
various crops of cane sugar begin. All the West India
islands begin in January, except Cuba, which is a
month earlier. In the United States the cane sugar
districts of Louisiana and Texas begin in Septem-
ber. Mexico, like Cuba, begins in December. In
South America, British Guiana has two crops, May and
October, while the Argentine gets to work in June.
In the East, Java, a most important crop, begins in

CANE AND BEET 25

May ; Formosa and the Philippines in December, and
British India about the same time. Egypt works in
January, and Mauritius in August. August is also
the crop time in Natal. In Australia and the Fiji
Islands June is the month.

CHAPTER III

CANE JUICE

WE now begin the main part of our subject, the
extraction of the sugar from the cane or the beetroot.
With the cane the first thing is, with all speed, to get
the juice out of it and to get as much of it as possible.
In primitive days — or even now in primitive countries —
they crushed the cane between two vertical rollers of
wood or stone, driven by bullocks or by hand. By
this method they did not get half the juice, but the
remains of the cane made good fuel for boiling the juice.
In course of time iron rollers were substituted for wood
and stone, and were set horizontally. The driving
power for this more powerful mill was wind or water,
as in the case of the old flour mill. The island of
Barbadoes is not, like its neighbours, mountainous,
and is, therefore, well suited to the use of windmills,
especially as it has a fairly breezy climate. Many
of these windmills may still be seen driving the
sugar mills in that fertile, industrious, successful and
well-populated little colony.

But a great revolution has tal&n place in most tropical
sugar-producing regions. Extended cultivation soon
required new implements capable of dealing with large
quantities of cane in an expeditious and economical
way. The three-roller mill, driven by steam power,
soon became the rule. This machine consists of two
rollers placed side by side but with a space between,
and another above them nearly touching them. The
engine drives gearing which reduces and regulates the
speed of the three rollers to the required pace. The

26

CANE JUICE 27

lower rollers revolve in the same, the upper one in the
opposite direction. A travelling band or " carrier "
conveys the canes to the mouth of the mill, care being
taken that they are so evenly distributed as to form a
constant and uniform feed. The canes enter between
the front roller and the upper one, only just space enough
being left between the two rollers to permit them to
catch hold of the canes, and draw them through. Be-
tween the two lower rollers, just below the centre of
the circumference of the upper roller, is a metal plate
which causes the crushed cane to turn towards the
space between the back roller and the upper one, where
it is again drawn in and crushed a second time. These
rollers are placed much closer together, because the
already partially crushed cane can now be forced through
a narrower entrance. This double crushing may, if
well done in a sufficiently powerful mill, extract sixty
per cent, of the juice in the cane. This had to be
improved upon if cane was to compete with beetroot.
The arrangement now is a combination of three of
these three-roller mills set tandem fashion, with carriers
to convey the crushed cane from the first to the second
and from the second to the third. It might be imagined
that when the crushed cane, called megass — or, in
French, bagasse — issues from the third mill it has lost
all its juice. Unfortunately, this is not so, and therefore
other expedients have been adopted to still further
reduce the quantity of sugar left in the megass. The
rollers in the second and third mill are placed closer
together in order more completely to squeeze the now
attenuated strips of crushed cane. Those mills are
also driven at a slightly slower speed. But important
additions have of late years been made. It was found
that the first of the two crushings in the front mill did
not do much more than break the outside rind of the

28 SUGAR

cane, and that a larger quantity of cane could be worked
with the same power if the cane could be cut or torn
up to a certain extent before entering the first rollers.
Cane cutters or " shredders " were, therefore, intro-
duced in front of the triple arrangement of mills. An-
other and perhaps better contrivance was afterwards
adopted, a pair of rollers with V-shaped corrugations,
which slightly break the canes, and thus enable them
to be more thoroughly and quickly crushed in the
first mill.

But still there was too much sugar left in the final
megass. The next scheme, therefore, was to pour
water on the carriers between the first and second,
and the second and third mills. This water, if properly
sucked up by the megass, dilutes the juice and, therefore,
the juice in the final megass, being thus diluted, contains
less sugar. Dilution of the juice is, of course, objection-
able, because it involves the consumption of more fuel
in the subsequent evaporation. Very careful calcula-
tions are, therefore, necessary, based on the value of
sugar and the cost of fuel, in order to arrive at the point
where saving of sugar costs more than the value of the
sugar saved. To reduce the dilution as much as possible
it is now customary to use the diluted juice from the
last mill to wash — " macerate " it is called — the megass
on its way from the first to the second mill. A careful
note of the density — specific gravity, tested by the
hydrometer — is taken at the last mill in order to main-
tain uniformity of maceration, and to make sure that
the dilution does not exceed the calculated maximum
to be permitted.

The exhausted megass goes straight to the boiler-
house for fuel. The great improvement in special
boiler furnaces for the consumption of megass now
generally enables cane sugar factories to raise all the

30 SUGAR

large quantities of steam required for evaporation and
driving without the use of any other fuel — a great
advantage for cane over beet.

The juice is caught in a trough below the mills and
flows to a vessel where it is roughly strained from the
quantity of finely divided cane fibre which falls down
with it, and is then pumped up to the clarifiers.

Cane juice is a substance of somewhat complex
character. The juice from the first mill is comparatively
pure, limpid and of a light colour. But the continued
crushing in the second and third mills brings more
impurities into it. The colouring matter from the
rind of the cane gets into it ; so do the organic salts,
gums and albumen, all of which make it more and
more viscous and quite impossible to filter or evaporate
without previous very careful and complete clarification,
a matter for consideration in a following chapter.

A good ripe sugar cane contains, on the average, about
seventy-five per cent, of water, twelve to fifteen per cent,
of crystallizable sugar, one to one and a half per cent, of
uncrystallizable sugar, ten per cent, of fibre, less than
one per cent, of incombustible matter — called " ash,"
— and less than one per cent, of organic acids, gums and
albumen. The ash consists of very varying proportions,
according to the nature of the soil and of the manures,
of silica, potash, lime, magnesia and soda, mentioned in
the order of their importance, silica and potash being
the main ingredients. The silica exists mostly in the
form of silicates of an alkaline base. The alkaline
bases, mostly potash, are also in combination with
organic acids, which disappear on incineration, or with
phosphoric and sulphuric acid, and chlorine, all of
which constitute part of the ash.

It is now necessary, before going further, to explain
the nature of the three kinds of sugar contained in

CANE JUICE 31

the sugar cane, one crystallizable and two called
" uncrystallizable." These are only rough and ready
expressions for which more accurate words have now been
substituted. But an explanation of the difference
between the three kinds of sugar, and of their proper
names, requires a brief preliminary description of the
way in which the quantity of these sugars in cane juice,
or any other sugar solution, is determined.

The polariscope is an interesting instrument, and its
use in every sugar factory or refinery, and also in every
commercial transaction in raw sugar, is now universal
and essential. Its construction is based on two facts.
The first is that when light passes through certain
crystals, calc spar for instance, if the crystal be properly
adjusted the light is divided into two rays one of which,
has become " polarized." This means that the light
ceases to be diffused equally in all directions, but only
shines in one plane. The second fact is that if this
ray of polarized light be passed through a solution ol
crystallizable sugar its plane will ba deflected to the
right.

The business of the polariscope is to measure the
extent of this deflection, and thus detect the quantity
of sugar contained in the solution, a very ingenious and
complicated process. The general facts can, perhaps,
be given without too many technicalities. If light
were made to pass through a properly adjusted crystal
and thus converted into a polarized ray, and if this
ray were then intercepted by another similar crystal,
similarly adjusted, the polarized ray would pass freely
through the second crystal. But if, between the two
crystals, were inserted a tube containing a solution
of sugar the light would no longer pass through the
second crystal because the plane of the ray would have
been deflected by the sugar. The second crystal

32 SUGAR

would have to be turned until it arrived at the angle
to which the ray had been deflected. When the light
had fully reappeared, the angle through which the
crystal had been turned would indicate the amount
of deflection. An instrument could be imagined in
which the scale should be so adjusted, and the parts so
constructed that the zero should be the point where,
with pure water in the tube, the two crystals coincide
and the light passes through ; and the one hundred
point should be that to which, with a fixed weight of
pure sugar dissolved in a fixed volume of water in the
tube, the crystal would exactly arrive in order to trans-
mit the full light of the deflected ray. In practice,
it is necessary to adopt a more complicated arrangement
in order to secure accuracy. Between the tube and the
second crystal is inserted a " compensator " con-
structed of two wedge-shaped crystals, which can be
shifted across each other by means of a screw until
they exactly compensate or neutralize the deflection
caused by the sugar, and allow the ray once more to
pass through the second crystal. The screw at the same
time moves a vernier scale on which the operator can
read off the percentage of sugar contained in the tube.
But this does not give absolute accuracy because the
exact point of maximum light or maximum darkness
is difficult to detect. Behind the polarizing crystal,
between it and the tube, is therefore inserted a plate
of quartz, made of two plates joined together side by
side, with their axes opposed, the one from right to
left and the other from left to right, the join being a
perpendicular line in the centre. The eye of the operator
now sees, when the ray is not deflected, a field of uniform
colour. But when the ray is deflected by the sugar
he sees the field divided by a sharp perpendicular
line into two different colours. As he moves the

34 SUGAR

compensator the colours become more uniform, and when
an absolute uniformity of colour has been restored he
reads off. on the scale the percentage of sugar. This
method gives great accuracy, but the instrument has
now been superseded — perhaps in the interest of those
who are colour blind — by one in which shadow is sub-
stituted for colour, which is said to be still more
accurate.

Thus is the quantity of crystallizable sugar accurately
determined in the laboratory. The other varieties of
sugar, called uncrystallizable,have an avidity for oxygen ;
their quantity is therefore determined • by measuring
the quantity of a standardized solution of oxide of
copper (cupric oxide) which is " reduced " by the
sugar solution to the insoluble form of cuprous oxide,
which contains less oxygen. The uncrystallizable
sugars are therefore called " reducing sugars." They
generally exist in the form of equal quantities of dextrose
and levulose, which mixture is created by the action
of acid and heat on the crystallizable sugar, which is
now called sucrose. This mixture is called " invert
sugar " because it deflects the polarized ray to the left
instead of to the right.

But dextrose and levulose also exist separate in
varying small quantities in the sugar cane. Dextrose
is so called because it deflects the ray to the right, but
not so much as sucrose. Levulose is so called because it
largely deflects the ray to the left. Dextrose is produced
in large quantities for industrial purposes by the action
of acid on the starch contained in grain, and is called
glucose. Maize is generally used for the purpose, and
the United States is the largest producer. In that form
it is a dull greyish white viscous substance with a
sickly-sweetish taste. It is also produced in a solid
form. Levulose is also called fructose or fruit sugar.

CANE JUICE 35

It does not appear in sound ripe canes, but can be found
in unripe or overipe ones. Dextrose exists in both
ripe and unripe cane, and is also found in many other
plants. But the existence of dextrose and levulose as
separate substances is a mere nothing compared with
the quantity of them produced by the decomposition
of sucrose into " invert sugar." This is the " golden
syrup " and also the " brewers' sugar " of commerce.
If very pure it has the appearance and flavour of honey.
Honey itself is invert sugar.

All these sugars are called " carbo - hydrates "
because they consist of carbon combined with hydrogen
and oxygen in the proportions in which those two
elements exist in water. They are formed by the
tissues of the leaves of the sugar cane, under the influence
of the light of the sun, combining the water of the
plant with the carbonic acid of the atmosphere. The
stronger the light the more rapid the process. Sucrose
is created and conveyed to the stalk. If the process
is too rapid during the daytime starch is stored up,
and this in the night season is converted into dextrose.
Part of the sucrose may also be inverted and thus a
little levulose added to the dextrose. The respiration
of the plant requires these " reducing sugars,"
converting them back to water and carbonic acid.
Some of the sugars are conveyed to the green top of the
growing plant, and further inversion takes place to
assist the vigorous growth by vigorous respiration.
The reducing sugar also assists in the formation of the
fibre of the cane, and some of it combines with nitro-
genous substances to form albuminous matter. As
the plant ripens and the leaves begin to fall the vigorous
respiration slackens, less reducing sugar is required,
and the sucrose is stored up in the cells of the pith of
the cane. A growing cane, therefore, contains much

36 SUGAR

reducing sugar — or invert sugar — used for growing
purposes, while a ripe cane contains sucrose with a very
small admixture of invert sugars. When the lower
leaves die the sucrose is increased only from the action
of the leaves which remain at the top, and the time
comes when there is no further increase. That is the
point of ripeness. After that the heat of the sun has
no further creative effect, but would, if the cane were
not cut, begin, with the help of the acids in the cane,
to convert sucrose into invert sugar.

The contents of the cane juice as it flows from the
mill can be stated roughly, but of course it varies
greatly according to the quality of the cane, and that
is very various in different countries and soils. The
variation also arises from the state of ripeness of the
cane. Here are figures of the analysis of cane juice
which has rather more uncrystallizable sugar than it
ought to have if it were perfectly ripe, but they suffice
to indicate the proportions of the various constituents
of the juice. They also illustrate the impurity of the
juice from the second mill as compared with that from
the first. They are taken from Prinsen Geerligs'
smaller work on cane sugar, published at the office of
The Sugar Cane, Altrincham, 1902.

Sucrose, 16'49 per cent.; glucose, 1'98 ; ash, 0'28;
gums, 0-125; albumen, 0*025 ; free acid, 0*048. The
density by the Brix hydrometer was 19- 2. This hydro-
meter professes to indicate the total quantity of dry
substance in solution. The quantity of sucrose, per cent,
of total dry substance, is, therefore, 85*9. This is
called " the quotient of purity." This is the analysis
of the juice as it flowed from the first mill. That of
the juice, without maceration, as it flowed from the
second mill gave the following changes. About the
same sucrose. Rather less glucose. Ash increased to

CANE JUICE 37

0'4 1. Gums increased to 0'346, just three times as
much. Albumen increased to 0'092, nearly four times
as much. Free acid increased to 0'072. Quotient of
purity reduced to 84*4. The reason why the glucose
was less is because the top part of the cane, which
contains the largest amount of glucose, and which is
the softest part, had been more thoroughly squeezed
by the first mill than the harder parts of the cane. The
third mill gave a purity quotient of 84. The colour
of the juice from the first mill was light, from the second
dark, from the third very dark. The word glucose
is here applied to all reducing sugars or invert sugars.

The extraction of juice by the Diffusion process
will be described in the next chapter, when dealing
with the subject of beet juice. It is one of the most
interesting subjects connected with sugar production.

4— (M63)

CHAPTER IV

BEET JUICE

FORTUNATELY for the producer of beetroot sugar his
raw material, the root, will keep fairly well, so he is
able to make sure of a constant and sufficient supply
from the day he begins work until his last load of roots
comes in. This is of immense advantage in the working
of such a delicate article as sugar juice. Interruption
of work is a most ruinous proceeding, but it must
sometimes happen in the case of the sugar cane.

The roots have to be delivered to the factory as free
as possible from soil or stones, and thoroughly trimmed
as to the crown and the rootlets. They go straight
to the washing machine where they are completely
cleansed. Their next visit is to the weighing machine,
because in some countries the duty was levied on the
weight of the roots. In any case, the manufacturer
must know the exact weight of the roots he works, and
the knowledge is also necessary for fiscal statistical
purposes.

Then comes the extraction of the juice. Fifty
years ago this was done by tearing the roots into pulp
in a powerful machine, and then squeezing the juice
out of the pulp by hydraulic pressure. It was an
interesting process to watch. The number of hands it
employed was remarkable. There was a constant
rushing about of people in a hurry ; first to fold up
the pulp in cloths and place it on the trays to go to the
press ; then the carrying of these trays and adjusting
them, one above another, on the press. And while
this was going on an opposite gang was as busy removing

BEET JUICE 39

the pressed pulp from another press, disposing of the
pressed cake of valuable cattle food, and running for
more pulp to recharge the second press. And so on
for all the row of presses.

The trouble and expense of this method of work
soon led to the invention of various kinds of continuous
presses, which did the work without all this expenditure
of labour and loss of time. Some of these presses did
their duty fairly well, and were regarded at the time
as the height of perfection.

But a great revolution was approaching. In the
year 1860, Julius Robert, sugar manufacturer at
Seelowitz in Austria, successfully put into practical
form an entirely new method of extracting the juice
from the beetroot, called the Diffusion process. His
success was complete. All the sugar factories in Ger-
many and Austria gradually adopted it, and in little
more than ten years its use had become universal in
those two countries. In some parts of a beetroot
factory of to-day, instead of pandemonium you would
find almost silence. You begin to wonder where the
workmen are, and where is the sugar juice. You see
a vast room, full of tall cylindrical vessels armed at the
top with a complicated regiment of valves, and appar-
ently doing nothing. You hear, indeed, one machine
making a slight noise on an upper floor, but you see
no one until, perhaps, a solitary man begins to manipu-
late one or two of the valves. That is the only sign
of life which you can, at the first glance, detect in that
very important wing of the establishment.

This process of Diffusion is so interesting, and has
had such an important bearing on the success of the
industry, that it must be described in some detail.
It was found, some sixty years ago, that when two
liquids of different densities are separated by a

40 SUGAR

membranous partition a process of diffusion takes place,
the denser passing into the lighter, and the lighter
into the denser liquid. This occurs in spite of the fact
that the membrane is not a filtering medium. It
was also found that if the denser liquid contained in
solution a mixture of cry st alii zable and uncrystallizable
substances, the former would diffuse freely into the
lighter liquid, while the uncrystallizable would hardly
diffuse at all. This phenomenon was called osmosis,
or osmose. The diffusion of the cry st alii zable sub-
stances into the lighter liquid was called exosmose,
and that of the lighter into the heavier liquid, endos-
mose. The easily diffusing substances were called
crystalloids, and the others, such as gum, albumen,
gelatine or glue (colle) were called colloids. If, therefore,
there should be on one side of the membrane a quantity
of the juice of the beetroot or the cane, containing
crystallizable sugar mingled with many gummy and
gelatinous substances, and on the other side water,
the solution of sugar would diffuse into the water, and
the water into the sugar juice until the liquids on each
side of the membrane became of the same density.
If the water containing the sugar were then drawn
off and fresh water substituted the diffusion would
recommence, and this process might be continued until
the whole of the sugar had passed away in the form of
a nearly pure solution, while the impurities would remain
alone in the solution which was originally sugar
juice. The membrane may be animal or vegetable —
parchment paper, for instance, answers the purpose.

But in nature the walls of the cells of plants form
a diffusing medium. The sugar in the beetroot or the
cane exists shut up inside the cells. It was found that
it could be extracted in the way described above, by
diffusion.

42 SUGAR

The apparatus for doing so is constructed and worked
in the following way. A number of large vertical
cylindrical vessels are ranged either in rows or in a
circle. They are furnished with a well secured man-
hole at the top and bottom, and with pipes which
convey hot water to each vessel, and others which convey
the liquid from each vessel to its next door neighbour,
passing on their way through a heater which keeps the
liquid up to a certain temperature. The pipes are
arranged so that the liquid can be passed from one
vessel to another either at the top or the bottom, or
can be drawn off when the process of diffusion is com-
pleted. On the floor which commands the top of this
battery of vessels are the valves by which the man in
charge is able to conduct the operations. On an upper
floor is the machine which cuts the roots into slices,
all of the same size and shape, so that they can lie in
the vessels without getting jammed together, but
leaving room for the water to flow freely round them.
If the battery is arranged in a circle the slices from above
can be directed by a revolving shoot into any one of
the vessels. On the upper floor is also the hot-water
tank, situated sufficiently high to give the necessary
pressure for the circulation of the liquid through the
vessels of the diffusion battery.

Let us suppose that all the vessels (8, 12, 14 or 16,
as the case may be) are filled with slices, and the openings
at the top through which the slices have been shot
securely closed. Hot water from above is then turned
on to the first vessel until it is full. Diffusion of the
sugar takes place, and the density inside and outside
the cells begins to approach to uniformity. Before the
diffusion seriously slackens its pace the water — now
a weak solution of sugar — is passed on to the second
vessel, after traversing the intermediate heater, and

44 SUGAR

meets with fresh slices. Here the density of the juice
in the cells exceeds that of the weak sugar solution,
and diffusion goes on briskly. The process is con-
tinued through about half a dozen vessels. The solu-
tion of sugar when it has travelled so far is so nearly
of the same density as the juice in the cells, that diffusion
practically ceases. The sugar solution — called diffusion
juice — is, therefore, drawn off, and goes to a measuring
tank, and thence to the clarifiers to ' commence the
defecation process. We now have six vessels of the
diffusion battery of which it may be said roughly that
in the first the slices have lost nearly half their sugar,
in the second they may have lost about a quarter,
and so on up to the sixth where very little sugar has
been diffused out.

When the weak sugar solution left the first vessel
fresh water was turned on, and followed in the round.
A fresh exhaustion of the slices results, the process will
finish at the seventh vessel, and again the contents
of a vesselful of diffusion juice will be measured and
go to the defecation. We can imagine the process
continued until the whole battery of vessels is at work.
The liquid is circulating under pressure the whole time,
but when the moment comes that the slices in No. 1
are exhausted ah1 its connections are turned off, the
pressure is transferred to No. 2, the man-hole below
in No. 1 is opened and the exhausted slices are shot out
by means of compressed air. If the battery is circular
there is a pit in the centre towards which the opening
at the bottom of each vessel is directed, and which
receives the wet exhausted slices. That the slices
may be loosened, in order to be more easily ejected,
the last charge of water to that vessel is directed from
the bottom upwards. The vessel is at once refilled
with fresh slices, and becomes the last instead of the

BEET JUICE 45

first of the series. This is, roughly, the method of
working the diffusion battery ; but the rate at which it
works, how often each vessel is filled and emptied,
and how quickly the diffusion juice is passed from one
to another, are matters which require most accurate
regulation and supervision.

The diffusion juice is, of course, much purer than
the cane juice which, as we have seen, is sadly spoiled
by the violent crushing to which the cane is subjected
in powerful modern cane mills. The diffusion juice
contains the sugar and some portion of the salts of the
beetroot. It may also contain small traces of the
gummy and albuminous impurities, but the bulk of
them remain in the cells of the exhausted slices. Of
course, in the process of cutting the slices a certain
number of cells are broken, and from these broken cells
the impurities must find their way into the diffusion
juice.

The superiority of this process over the crushing
of the cane, as described in the last chapter, is so striking,
that it may well be asked why cane mills have not been
superseded by diffusion. Many cane sugar manufac-
turers have asked themselves the same question, and
some have answered it by putting up a diffusion plant.
But it cannot be said that the experiment has been
altogether satisfactory. The cutting of the cane into
slices is not a very easy operation, but that objection
might perhaps be waived if other things went well.
Diffusion involves dilution of the juice to the extent
of at least twenty per cent. Maceration between the
mills of a triple cane mill ought never to create a dilution
of more than ten to fifteen per cent. This extra dilution
in the diffusion process is a serious thing with a cane-
sugar factory which relies on its megass for the whole
of its steam-raising fuel. Moreover, the megass left

46 SUGAR

from the diffusion battery of a cane sugar factory is
very inferior to ordinary megass as fuel, and requires
pressing and drying before it can be used. This is a
rather fatal objection. Again, a beetroot factory need
never, or hardly ever, stop for want of roots ; but a
cane factory may often have to suspend work for want
of canes. With mills this is easily done, but with
diffusion it involves considerable loss. Suddenly to
stop a diffusion battery for want of raw material means
that all the juice in the battery, most of it very thin,
must be worked up as it is or a considerable loss of sugar
incurred. A diffusion battery requires great regularity
in the quality of the raw material. But a cane mil]
is obliged sometimes to work up a large extra quantity
of damaged cane in a hurry. With mills this can be
done, but it would be impossible with diffusion.

Diffusion can, under favourable circumstances, ex-
tract ninety-five per cent, of the sugar in the cane.
Mills are now so much improved that, with all recent
appliances, they can get more than ninety per cent,
of the sugar in the cane. The reason for adopting
diffusion is, therefore, not so strong as it was some
years ago, and is more than counterbalanced by the
disadvantages.

There are several cane sugar factories in various
countries that have tried the diffusion process. The
most remarkable instance is the late Mr. Minchin's
factory at Aska in Madras. The writer of these lines
made an extended tour of the European beetroot
districts with Mr. Minchin as far back as 1871, and on
that occasion they paid a visit of several days to Mr.
Robert, the inventor of the diffusion process, at his
home at Seelowitz in Austria. Mr. Minchin knew him
well, and had already been working the diffusion process
at Aska for some years. As the process was only

BEET JUICE 47

invented in 1860 Minchin must undoubtedly have been
the earliest pioneer of that invention in the cane sugar
industry. He stuck to it bravely for more than thirty
years, and possibly it may be still working.

The exhausted bset slices from the diffusion battery
are, of course, saturated with water which has to be
pressed out. They are then either at once delivered
to the farmer for cattle food or stored in pits till wanted.
In the latter case they ferment, and are said to be
preferred by the cattle in that state. Recently various
methods of artificially drying the pulp have been
adopted and will, no doubt, become general. The pulp
makes a very good cattle food if judiciously mixed with
chopped straw or hay. The writer has seen it mixed
with the molasses of the factory, which seems a very
natural and reasonable plan, and also a good way of
utilizing a by-product which fetches a very poor
price in the market when sold for distilling or to
the special factories which extract its sugar by chemical
process.

The well-known inventor, Steffen, has suggested the
idea of extracting less than the maximum quantity of
sugar from the roots, and drying the resulting pulp,
rich in sugar, which ought to obtain a high price for
cattle-feeding. The suggestion has not yet been adopted
on any considerable scale.

A combination of crushing the sugar cane in the
usual way and then treating the megass in a diffusion
battery, called the Naudet process, has recently attracted
some attention. Sixty-five per cent, of the juice is
first extracted in the mill, and the megass is then loaded
into the diffusion battery. The juice, heated and mixed
with lime as if it were going to the clarifiers, is then
poured on to the megass, and transferred from vessel
to vessel as in the diffusion process. This process

48 SUGAR

dispenses with the elaborate clarifying and filtering
operations.

The following analysis of the beetroot is given in
Horsin-Deon's book of 1894, " Le Sucre et 1'industrie
Sucriere." Water 80 per cent., sugar 15, cellulose and
woody fibre 1, gummy matters 0'6, albumen and other
nitrogenous substances 1-6, other organic substances 1,
mineral matters 0'8 per cent. Since then the average
percentage of sugar has risen in many countries 2 per
cent. Even the sugar actually extracted has risen
in some favoured districts to more than 16 per cent,
in a good season. This beats cane sugar hollow. But
then the beetroot farmers only produce on the average,
in the most favoured countries, 10 to 14 tons of roots
to the acre, whereas the sugar cane is produced at the
rate of twenty to forty tons to the acre. The sugar
cane in Java, that most successful sugar-producing
country, cannot be said to contain, on the average,
more than 12 to 15 per cent, of sugar, and the quantity
actually extracted does not, on the average, exceed
10J to lOf per cent. But, as has been already stated,
they produce in Java, on the average, more than four
tons of high-class sugar to the acre. The average
production of European beetroot sugar is well under
two tons to the acre.

There is one peculiarity of the beetroot juice which is
of great importance : it contains no uncrystallizable
sugar. Good raw beetroot sugar, therefore, is entirely
free from what is roughly called glucose. The juice,
moreover, is not acid and, therefore, does not become
inverted so rapidly as cane juice. Here beet has a great
advantage over cane. But in some of our sugar colonies,
Jamaica and Demerara for instance, the final product,
molasses, which of course contains, among other
things, the invert sugar existing in the cane and largely

BEET JUICE 49

increased in the process of manufacture, is converted
into rum, which is a valuable by-product of the industry
in those countries.

As to the extra purity of diffusion juice in a cane
sugar factory, as compared with mill juice in the same
factory, Noel Deerr, in his excellent book (1905) " Sugar
and the Sugar Cane,"1 gives the figures from a Cuban
factory working mills and diffusion side by side. Some-
times the ingredients of a sugar solution are defined
roughly under only two designations — " sugar " and
" non-sugar." The object of a sugar factory is to get
out as much sugar and as little non-sugar as possible.

Mills Diffusion

Breaker 1st Mill 2nd Mill

Non-sugar I 2.Q1 2.25 2.54 ^
per cent. J

Purity quotient 89.7 87'8 86'5 90'3

The difference is not so striking as might be expected.
1 Published by Norman Rodger, 2 St. Dunstan's Hill, E.G.

CHAPTER V

CLARIFICATION

THE speed with which canes should be brought to the
mill to be crushed, so as to avoid the danger of rapid
changes in composition, is still more important with
the juice itself after its extraction from the cane. It
contains many kinds of impurities, and the more com-
plete the extraction the greater is the amount of
impurity. Among other things there are the germs of
fermentation which would at once commence if the
juice were not speedily subjected to the operations
of clarification and defecation.

To go back again to primitive methods, such as
still exist in primitive countries like British India,
China, the Philippines, and even some parts of Brazil,
the juice is at once poured by the small native grower
into an iron pot over a wood fire ; wood ashes and lime
are added, which create s-cum. This is skimmed off
the top until it ceases to rise, and the clear juice is then
allowed to boil until it reaches the point where it will
crystallize when cooled. When cold the crystalline
mass is removed, and is ready for the market. In
India it is called Gur or Jaggery ; in the Philippines,
Taal or Zebu, or Ilo Ilo, according to the district from
which it comes. In Brazil it has many strange names,
but here it was called by the name of the port of ship-
ment, Pernams (Pernambuco), Bahias, Maceios, and
so on. Those from India, Manilla, and China are dark
brown masses of sugar and impurities mixed up together.
These sugars, and those from Brazil, used to come to
this country in considerable quantities from time to

50

CLARIFICATION 51

time when prices were good, and formed no small part
of the raw material of some British refineries.

In our West Indian Colonies the process of clarifica-
tion was carried on, and still continues in some places,
in a similar but much superior fashion. The " Copper
Wall" was universal sixty years ago in the West Indies.
It is simply a row of copper basins, with a blazing fire
underneath them going the whole length of the row
and then up the chimney. The juice, much purer
than that from the powerful modern mills with all
their appliances, contained nevertheless much albumin-
ous and gummy matter which must be removed. The
copper wall combined clarification and crystallization.
In the first copper milk of lime was added, and the scum
skimmed off ; in the succeeding coppers, to which the
juice was ladled from No. 1, a further skimming or
brushing took place, and when the juice reached the
last of the six coppers it had become thick enough and
pure enough to crystallize when cool into an excellent
raw sugar, called muscovado, the principal raw material
of the British sugar refiner sixty years ago.

But new appliances, in the course of time, took the
place of the copper wall. The vacuum pan was invented
for carrying out a more perfect kind of crystallization.
Then came the European beetroot industry, which
introduced many varieties of clarification and defecation.
Capable men took up the subject and gradually developed
a really scientific system of dealing with sugar juice.
Lime was still the basis of the system, but it was no
longer used in a haphazard or rule-of-thumb manner.
Lime is absolutely necessary, especially with cane
juice, which is naturally acid ; but though it removes
impurities it is liable to create more than it removes
by forming lime compounds very detrimental to the
subsequent crystallization. The beetroot factories

52 SUGAR

proceeded to get over this difficulty by introducing
carbonic acid gas into the defecating pans, which pre-
cipitated the excess of lime in the form of insoluble
carbonate. The cane sugar manufacturers are learning
the lesson from their European competitors, and are
now beginning to practise, in countries where science
reigns supreme, as complete a system of defecation
by lime and carbonic acid as can be found in the most
up-to-date beetroot factory.

We must skip over as lightly as possible the inter-
mediate processes which preceded the perfected methods
of to-day. The copper wall was superseded by an
operation completed in one vessel, where the juice was
heated by steam, the lime scums removed from the
surface and partly allowed to fall to the bottom of the
vessel, from which they were subsequently removed,
the clear juice being run off for concentration in the
vacuum pan. Another method was to heat the juice in
a special juice heater and then, when the air bubbles
had thus been removed, run it into the defecating pan
where lime was added, the lime and impurities all falling
to the bottom in the absence of air bubbles, and the
clear juice being decanted.

In all these various processes the important point
is to hit off the exact quantity of lime necessary. Too
much lime would be worse than too little. But even
when exactly the right quantity is used it does not
remove all the impurities. Many modifications were
introduced, continuous defecators were invented, new
methods of heating the juice before entering the defecator
were adopted, but no really satisfactory results are
likely t6 be obtained until the lessons taught in the
beetroot factories are learned and applied. The pre-
liminary heating of the juice before defecation not only
drives out the air bubbles but. what is much more

5 -(1463)

54 SUGAR

important, coagulates the albumen. The addition of
lime in the defecating pan not only neutralizes the
acidity of the juice but also combines with the albumen
and creates flocculent precipitates which carry down
with them a portion of the gummy impurities and also
all suspended substances, such as fibre, wax, colouring
matter, and the dirt which had adhered to the canes.
The albumen is almost if not entirely removed. The
gums and pectine, a gelatinous substance akin to gum,
are reduced to about half their quantity, and the
quotient of purity is raised about two per cent.

But great skill and care are necessary in this process
of clarification. Too little lime fails to carry away all
the acids, albumen and gummy matters, and the
precipitation is imperfect and slow. Too much lime,
on the other hand, attacks the glucose, combines with
the resulting organic acids and forms viscous substances
very injurious not only to the subsequent crystallization
but even to the body of the sugar itself. The exact
point of right quantity can be ascertained by rough
experiment easily carried out, but it all depends upon
the operator that this shall be done correctly. In mak-
ing raw sugar for the refiner the object of the operator
is to keep the juice as nearly neutral as possible, but
with a slight tendency towards alkalinity. This secures
that the resulting sugar, when crystallized, shall not be
acid and, therefore, shall not deteriorate in quality.

But there is much sugar made now, roughly called
" Demerara sugar," which is intended to be consumed
in the form of raw sugar. Large quantities of sugar
were, in former days, consumed in the raw state. They
were the superior kinds of muscovado sugar, from
Barbadoes, Jamaica and Porto Rico. It was only
the lighter coloured varieties with a yellowish tinge
which were good enough for the grocer. They were

CLARIFICATION 55

sweet and fragrant, with a pleasant flavour of the
sugar cane. But when the home refiners produced
yellow sugar with a pale primrose tint the poor old
muscovadoes were thrown rather into the shade. Then
came the new raw sugars from our colony of Demerara
which soon cut out all competitors. They were crystal-
lized in the vacuum pan and had a large bold crystal of a
pretty yellowish tinge. Trinidad followed the example
of its neighbour, then came St. Lucia, and now many
more imitators.

There is no secret now as to the method of preparing
the juice for making this sugar. A few words are
sufficient to give the general reader an idea of the
special preparation of the juice when " yellow crystals "
are to be made. There is a gas called sulphurous acid,
the product of burning sulphur, which has the property
of bleaching vegetable substances. In the days when
sulphur matches existed boys used to light one and
hold a flower over the smoke to see it turn white. The
cold juice from the mill, heavily limed, is pumped to
the top of a tower or vertical box, where it runs down
the inside over a series of perforated trays which scatter
the juice in a shower. Sulphurous acid gas is intro-
duced at the bottom under pressure, so that the juice
and the gas thoroughly mingle. While the juice is
descending the gas is rising to the top of the tower. An
alternative system is to blow the gas through perforated
pipes into the bottom of a tank full of cold limed juice.
The effect of these processes is to nearly neutralize the
lime with sulphurous acid. The viscosity is greatly
reduced and the subsequent work of crystallization
and " curing " greatly facilitated. The juice must
not be heated until neutralization is nearly complete.
The action of the acid on the cold limed juice is to bleach
it, and to break up the organic soluble salts, substitut ing

56 SUGAR

insoluble sulphites. The resulting juice, being now
acid, is bright in colour, but in order to maintain this
colour up to the time of crystallization it is necessary
to keep it rather on the acid side of neutrality. If
there is any fear of alkalinity, phosphoric acid is used
in the defecator, which precipitates any excess of lime.
Of course, great skill and experience is necessary in
carrying out this special process for the purpose of
producing bright yellow crystallized sugar, first by
maintaining the bright colour of the juice and, secondly,
by avoiding the danger of " inversion " in its slightly
acid state. When all precautions are properly taken
the result is a bright yellow sugar which fetches a fancy
price ; but if not, the product will be a dingy yellow
or even grey sugar, and will not be a success in the
market. When there is a poor demand for yellow sugar
the factory goes back to the ordinary defecation process
and makes " refining centrifugals " for sale to refiners.
The cost of production is less, and the yield of sugar
is generally rather better — and there is always a market.
In some factories it appears that the treatment of the
cold juice with the acid precedes the liming of the juice,
apparently a still more dangerous process. It is said
that yellow crystals are more difficult to produce now
that more powerful mills produce a juice of less purity.
We now turn to the clarification and defecation of
the beetroot juice, and must enter on a brief review
of the processes which led up to the present perfected
system of what is called " carbonatation." The juice
of beetroot, like that of cane, contains certain impurities
which have to be removed before the juice is fit for
filtration, evaporation and, finally, crystallization.
Fortunately it contains no glucose and, therefore, there
is no creation of those inconvenient and injurious
organic acids which are produced in cane juice when

58 SUGAR

the lime attacks and decomposes some of the glucose.
In the beginning the beetroot factories followed the
example of their brethren in caneland; they added
lime, the scum at the top was removed, the heavier
impurities sank to the bottom, and the intervening
clear juice was drawn off. That was simple clarification.
The juice was then boiled in open pans, and allowed
to crystallize as it cooled ; the result was a very excellent
raw sugar which can still be recollected and praised
by those who go back to the sixties. Very little of the
raw beetroot sugar is as good as it was then. It is a
curious fact that the modern agent, sulphurous acid,
was tried with beetroot sugar more than a hundred
years ago ; but science was not sufficiently advanced in
those days to make it a safe experiment. They even
tried sulphuric acid as a means of "throwing down the
excess of lime, and with some success. This method
was practised more or less up to 1849, when the idea of
using carbonic acid gas made its practical appearance.
It was called the Rousseau process. The juice, after
decantation from the defecating pan, was saturated
with the gas until the whole of the excess of lime was
thrown down in the form of insoluble carbonate. Ten
years later Perier and Possoz introduced double carbon-
atation, which is now the universal system. The name
of Jelinek is attached to this system in Austria. New
industrial methods and new scientific ideas have a habit
of springing up simultaneously in various quarters.

Among the gummy impurities is included pectine,
which, if the raw juice were left to itself, would rapidly
decompose into gelatinous substances converting the
whole mass into a sort of jelly. Other fermentations
would follow and attack the sugar itself. Lime throws
down this pectine as well as the organic acids, and
coagulates the albumen in a hot juice. But in a hot

CLARIFICATION 59

juice the lime, if not neutralized, would form with the
sugar various sucrates (or saccharates) of lime, some
soluble but some, unfortunately, insoluble. Here
would be a great loss of sugar because the insoluble
sucrate would disappear in the scum. Hence the
absolute necessity for some acid to neutralize the lime
and to set free again the sugar from its unstable com-
bination. There is another combination of sugar with
lime, discovered or defined by Boivin and Loiseau in
1868, which is interesting for other reasons. They called
it the sucrate of the hydrocarbonate of lime. It is a
gelatinous body but is broken up by further addition
of the gas.

It is clear from these facts that it is necessary to
saturate the limed juice thoroughly with carbonic acid
in order to make sure that no sugar finds its way into
the scum, and to commence the saturation before apply-
ing heat. But if the saturation were carried too far
part of the precipitated carbonate, which had carried
with it not only the impurities but also the colouring
matter, would become soluble, and the decolorized
juice would again become coloured. In the double
carbonatation the saturation is stopped before this
danger-point is reached, the decolorized and purified
juice is drawn off, and a second operation commenced.
More lime is added, and the juice is again saturated
with the gas up to the point where it is nearly but not
quite neutral.

The details of the operation may now be briefly
described. Milk of lime is added to the cold juice
directly it comes from the beetroot. This operation
is preferably performed in a separate vessel with a
mechanical stirrer. The limed juice then goes to the
carbonating vessel and the gas is injected while the
juice is still cold. Great frothing takes place, which is

60 SUGAR

kept down as much as possible by various means, and
a cover to the vessel is necessary to keep back any
overflow, and to allow superfluous gas to be carried
off up a chimney. When the action is in full force
moderate heat is applied through a steam coil at the
bottom of the vessel. The frothing begins to slacken
and tests are applied to samples of the juice to detect
the right point of alkalinity, nearly approaching to
neutrality. At that point it is found that a sample
of the juice in a glass indicates a quick and steady
precipitation of carbonate of lime, leaving a clear
bright juice above. It is now ready to go to the second
carbonatation. Decantation of the clear juice has,
of late years, been given up, as it is found difficult to
prevent some admixture of sediment. The machine
called a filter press was invented, through which the
juice and the precipitate are forced by pressure. The
clear juice flows out, and the lime precipitates are
retained in the chambers of the press in the form of
flat cakes containing the lime and the impurities of
the juice. A perfect regiment of these filter presses
forms an important part of the plant of a beetroot
sugar factory. The clear, bright juice goes to the second
carbonating .vessel, more lime is added, the gas is passed
through the liquid until the lime is completely saturated
the heat being raised higher than in the former vessel,
and the operation is finished. The juice again goes
through other filter presses, and is ready for evaporation
and then crystallization.

This was the process when the juice was extracted
in the old way by hydraulic presses. But now that
diffusion has become universal, even in France, and
furnishes a much purer juice, there is not so much
necessity to operate in the first instance on cold juice.
The juice from the diffusion batteries is already hot,

CLARIFICATION 61

and it is found that if this heat be kept up, and even
increased, the defecation goes quicker, and with
the purer juic"e also goes safely. Less lime may also
be used, but not to the extent of making the first
carbonatation imperfect, which would impede the
filtration.

In Java, where a large quantity of white sugar is
now turned out fit for direct consumption, the carbona-
tation process has been adopted in many factories,
and at one time it seemed probable that its use would
go on increasing. In cane juice there is a small quantity
of glucose. In the ordinary defecation, at a high
temperature, the lime attacks the glucose and forms
dark coloured, viscous substances which are most
inconvenient. But when working at the lower tem-
perature of the carbonatation process these lime salts
are partially insoluble, the rest being colourless and
innocuous. The juice becomes clear, light in colour,
and easily filtered and evaporated. Much more of the
gummy matters are thrown down than in the ordinary
defecation process. A second carbonatation is just as
necessary with cane as with beetroot juice, and for the
same reason. The first filtration must take place while
the juice is still alkaline, otherwise part of the pre-
cipitate would be redissolved, and the juice would
become coloured. Considerable quantities of lime are
necessary in order that the viscous precipitates may be
mingled with sufficient lime to make the filtration go
well. It is rather difficult to secure absolute neutrality
in the final juice and, therefore, a further saturation
with sulphurous acid is sometimes found advisable,
which also improves the colour of the juice.

This carbonatation process is evidently a more
expensive operation than ordinary defecation, but if
white sugar is to be made direct from the cane juice

62 SUGAR

it was considered essential. 1 In the case of the beet-
root, it has enabled well-managed factories to produce
excellent refined sugar. Even as far back as 1871 the
present writer saw loaf sugar produced direct from the
beetroot juice, and, at a later date, Langen, the inventor
of the process for making cube sugar, produced fine
cubes in his own beetroot sugar factory.

These are some of the wonderful results of science
applied to sugar production, and point to a great de-
velopment in the future. But this country, the largest
consumer, cares for none of these things.

1 As to white sugar in Java, a change has taken place in the
method of manufacture which may, in the future, have impor-
tant and wide-reaching results. The carbonatation process, as
has been explained, is an expensive process requiring great skill
and care. It requires a large mass o± special machinery, includ-
ing lime-kilns for the production of lime and carbonic acid ; and
those kilns require fuel. In tropical countries, limestone and
fuel may be difficult to obtain. But a still stronger objection
to the carbonatation process in Java is that frequently a factory
may find it necessary, for market purposes, to go back to the
production of raw sugar when the demand for that sugar is
stronger than the demand for white sugar for India. His car-
bonatation process would make it too good. The planters,
therefore, tried experiments, and found that neutralizing the
lime by sulphurous acid, a simple process, would, if properly
carried out, clarify the juice so well that white sugar quite as
good in every way could be turned out. More than half
of the Java crop is now white sugar of excellent colour and
quality.

CHAPTER VI

CRYSTALLIZATION

HAVING clarified and purified the cane juice, the next
step is with all speed to evaporate the water until
crystallization takes place. This, as we saw, was done
in the last coppers of the copper wall. But the great
waste of fuel and the excessive heat spoiling the sugar,
soon led to search for better methods. They cannot
all be enumerated, much less described, in a popular
treatise, but a few are worth a passing notice. Alfred
Fryer, the Manchester sugar refiner, to whom reference
has already been made as a man not only of ingenuity
but also of ready wit, maintained that the proper
way of making sugar in the tropics was to do so as
quickly as possible, and at a minimum cost, and to
send the rough raw material home to be converted
into refined sugar. He, therefore, about forty years
ago, invented, constructed and worked (in the West
Indies) a simple apparatus called Fryer's Concretor.
The clarified juice is run, in a thin stream, over a long
sloping platform of metal divided by trays into a series
of lanes from side to side, along which the thin stream
of juice slowly meanders in a zigzag direction. Heat
is applied underneath, and the thin film of juice evapor-
ates so rapidly that by the time it arrives at the other
end of the platform it is nearly ready to crystallize.
The evaporation is finished in a cylindrical vessel
fitted with plates which slowly revolves, hot air being
at the same time injected. This finishing process
exposes the juice to further heat, and completes the
evaporation. The juice is then run out, and allowed

64

CRYSTALLIZATION 65

to crystallize at its leisure into solid blocks, which
Fryer very appropriately called concrete. This ought
to be a very cheaply produced article of commerce,
and the idea appeared to be sound. But unfortunately
the concrete never " caught on " in the market. In
these days of Brewers' sugar there might be a better
demand.

Another method of rapid evaporation of juice in
the form of a thin mm was introduced about the same
time, called the Wetzel pan, the principle of which
was to heat the juice in a long trough in which slowly
revolved a long cylindrical wheel armed with a series
of discs, which constantly exposed, in its slow revolution,
a thin film of juice to the air, and thus set up a rapid
evaporation. Another form was to heat with steam
the wheel instead of the vessel containing the juice,
or to make the wheel to consist of a series of steam
pipes, placed either lengthways or round the circum-
ference. This method involved the expense of an engine
to drive it. At that time some of his brother sugar
refiners were one day explaining to Fryer the new
method of the Scottish refiners in boiling their yellow
sugars at a very low temperature, which not only
improved the colour but also enabled them to sell more
water in combination with the sugar. " Ah ! " said
Fryer, " that must be the wet sell process."

The Aspinall pan was another early system of evapora-
tion by steam heat. The steam passed into a chamber
in the pan, through which the juice circulated through
a series of vertical brass tubes until it was ready to
crystallize, when it was drawn off. Many modifications
of "this" were introduced, but all had the serious defect
of over-heating the juice. Also, when the juice thickens
evaporation goes on with great difficulty because
actual ebullition, at the temperature necessary for that

66 SUGAR

operation, would be fatal. Hence the introduction of
the vacuum pan, where the thick juice can be boiled
violently at a perfectly safe temperature. x It is, if
we look at its original form of fifty years ago, a slightly
flattened sphere of copper provided inside at the lower
part with a coil of steam pipe, and also with a steam
jacket. An air pump creates a partial vacuum, and a
condenser, through which the steam from the boiling
juice passes on its way to the air pump, by rapidly
condensing the vapour greatly helps to increase the
vacuum. The juice is always boiling more or less
violently, even when thick, and, therefore, throwing
off its vapour freely. This pan in its complete form
appeared about the year 1830, and about thirty years
afterwards began to be used in the tropics as a useful
adjunct to the preliminary evaporation of the thin
juice. The vacuum pan, in fact, finished the operation.
But it did more than this, it enabled the factory to
produce a more distinctly crystalline form of sugar
than the old muscovado kind, which comes from the
confused crystalline mass formed by the spontaneous
crystallization of the thickened juice when, on cooling,
it crystallizes of its own accord. But the use of the
vacuum pan did not become extensive for many years.
Mauritius and the French West Indian Islands were
the' first to use it on any considerable scale ; then came
Demerara, Berbice and Trinidad. Now it is used
everywhere, except in primitive countries.

The vacuum pan puts the finishing touches to the
thickened juice, but a great deal of evaporating has
to be done before the juice arrives at that state. Another

1 A solution of sugar must be heated above 212 F., the
boiling point of water, before it boils ; but in a partial vacuum
it boils violently at 160 F., and at even a lower temperature in
a more perfect vacuum.

CRYSTALLIZATION 67

kind of vacuum apparatus has been invented as best
suited to that earlier stage. The French call it the
Triple-effet, and that is now its name. It is a very
ingenious and successful contrivance, and came from
France, at that time the leading country in the produc-
tion of beetroot sugar. The inventor, Rillieux, had
to pass many long years, as inventors generally do,
before he could procure a good trial of his new idea.
In the old days of open pans and the heat of a naked
fire the French manufacturers had to burn 400 kilo-
grammes of coal for every ton of roots worked. When
steam was substituted for fire heat, and the steam
engine was allowed to enter the factory to drive an
air pump for the vacuum pan, they managed to do the
work with 250 instead of 400 kilogrammes of coal to
the ton of roots. Rillieux proposed to make a further
great reduction in the cost of fuel by evaporating the
greater portion of the water in the thin juice in a double
or triple arrangement of pans, where the steam from
the boiling juice in the first should heat the second, and
so on. This began to be accomplished about the year
1852. By 1882 it was brought to a fair degree of per-
fection, and the amount of fuel per ton of roots was
reduced to 80 kilogrammes.

The apparatus may be roughly described as consisting
of three vertical cylindrical vessels with dome-shaped
heads, ending in a wide neck which turns over and
downwards carrying the vapour to its next destination.
The lower part of each vessel is divided into three
parts, a small space at the bottom, then a much larger
space enclosed by two horizontal iron plates forming
the " steam drum," fitted with vertical copper pipes
permitting the juice, which enters at the small space
below it, to pass through the steam drum into the
large open space above it. The juice is allowed to rise

68 SUGAR

above the top of the steam drum, but not far enough
to incur the danger of boiling over. The final vessel
of this triple-effet is connected with the air pump
and condenser. Low pressure steam enters the drum
of the first vessel, the thin juice boils and begins to
thicken. It is transferred to vessel No. 2 ; vessel No. 1
being charged with fresh juice. The steam from the
evaporation of the juice in No. 1 goes into the steam
drum of No. 2, and boils the partially thickened juice.
There is a slight vacuum in No. 2 ; and even in No. 1
a slight vacuum is created by the rapid condensation
of its steam in the drum of No. 2. In No. 3, the vessel
nearest to the pump and condenser, the vacuum is greater.
The still thicker juice in No. 2 goes into No. 3 ; No. 2
is filled from No. 1, and fresh thin juice goes into No. 1.
The triple-effet is now in full work, which goes on
continuously. The steam from the boiling juice in
No. 2 goes into the steam drum of No. 3, and not only
boils the juice there, but improves the vacuum in No. 2
by its rapid condensation. The transfer of juice from
vessel to vessel, and from the thin juice tank to the first
vessel, takes place every time that a charge of sufficiently
thick juice is drawn from No. 3 to be cleaned and go to
the vacuum pan. The arrangements for drawing off
the water of condensation, and the precautions against
loss of sugar by the carrying over of bubbles of juice
in the steam, need not be detailed, nor the cleaning
of the copper tubes, and many other necessary operations
connected with this complex apparatus.

Here we have not only a great saving of steam, but
also a complete method for avoiding, as much as possible,
any injury to the sugar when the juice becomes thick
and, therefore, more sensitive. But the juice, which
was perfectly clear and bright when it entered the triple-
effet, loses its brightness as it passes through the process

CRYSTALLIZATION 69

of thickening, because many substances which were
soluble in the thin juice, become insoluble as it thickens.
These substances make the juice turbid, and also deposit
themselves in the tubes, which, therefore, require con-
stant cleansing. In the case of cane juice, phosphate,
sulphate, carbonate, silicate and oxalate of lime, oxide
of iron, silica and a few organic impurities are found
in this deposit. For this turbid, thickened juice, a
further clarification is necessary. If it has been through
the double carbonatation there will be no difficulty in
the filtration, but in the case of cane juice from the ordin-
ary defecation it must be treated again in the defecating
pans, and neutralized, if necessary, with sulphurous
or phosphoric acid, or, if acid, with soda. These help
the settlement of the precipitate. Acidity in thickened
cane juice may come from fermentation. The only
way to avoid this fatal trouble is cleanliness. That
must be the first rule in every sugar factory or refinery.
The triple-effet is now used universally in all large sugar
factories, and has sometimes become a Quadruple-effet.
Many modifications have appeared but need not be
described here in detail, though they are interesting
and instructive. Some are film evaporators, and some
substitute horizontal for vertical pans.

The thick juice, after filtration, goes to the vacuum
pan, and its treatment there depends on the kind of
sugar to be made. It may be boiled into large grained
yellow crystals, as in Demerara ; or into still larger
grained sugar which is afterwards washed white, as
in France ; or into small grained sugar, afterwards
washed white, as is the practice in Germany, Austria,
and Russia, in making " granulated " ; or into a supe-
rior crystalline raw sugar for the use of sugar refiners, as
is the case in Cuba, Peru, St. Domingo, Java, and many
other progressive cane sugar countries, and also in most

5-(i463)

70 SUGAR

of the beetroot sugar districts of Europe ; but seldom in
the United States, where " granulated " is almost uni-
versal. This kind of refining sugar is called " cen-
trifugal" to distinguish it from the lower classes called
muscovado. The " mother liquor " from the first crys-
tallization is either boiled into a second product or taken
back into the pan to mix again with the boiled mass.
The vacuum pan, which used to be quite a small,
nearly spherical vessel, is now made of an enormous
size for the use of factories where large quantities of
juice have to be dealt with. These large pans, instead
of having only one steam worm, are armed with a series
of them, the steam being first turned on in the lowest,
and then into each in succession as the pan gets fuller.
The process of boiling and crystallizing sugar in the
vacuum pan is quite a fine art. It must suffice to de-
scribe it very roughly in this popular treatise. Moreover,
there are infinite varieties of treatment, dependent
upon the purity or impurity of the material operated
upon, and the kind of sugar the operator desires to
produce. For instance, the loaf sugar which we see
in a Paris restaurant, a dull white lump of sugar without
any sparkling grain, is not crystallized at all in the pan.
The liquor is boiled down to such a thickness that it
will crystallize of itself while cooling. It is run into
the loaf-moulds where it rapidly crystallizes as it cools.
It forms a dull granulated mass. On the other hand,
the sparkling loaf or cube sugar used in this country
is made by most careful and skilful crystallization in
the pan. The liquor, as it covers only the lowest of
the steam coils, is brought to the crystallizing point,
and then comes the skill. Not only can the boiling
liquor be looked at through a window in the pan, but
samples can be taken from the hermetically sealed
pan, with what is called a proof-stick. The pan-man

CRYSTALLIZATION 71

carefully watches the appearance of the minute crystals
and allows just enough liquor to flow in to prevent a
confused mass of crystals being suddenly formed. He
thus maintains what is called an even grain — grains all
of one size. It is his business to maintain the even
grain from that moment until the pan is full, and the
boiled mass in an exactly fit state to go out, either
to the centrifugal machines or to the sugar moulds.
He allows the grains to come closer and closer together
as time goes on, and if he has done his work well it will
be found, when the contents of the pan goes down into
the receiver below, that the boiled mass — the masse-
cuite, as the French call it — contains a very even-sized
grain, with as few small grains in between as possible.
This is most important in making crystallized sugar
which is to be washed white in the centrifugal machines,
because there would be a wasting of the fine white
" first product " if any of the smaller grains found
their way out with the adhering syrup, and were thus
degraded into the after products. These rules apply
equally well in the case of white or yellow crystallized
sugar made in cane or beetroot sugar factories. The
French white crystals are boiled very large, and with
excellent skill. German, Austrian and Russian
" granulated " are boiled to a much smaller grain.
The pan is filled much fuller before grain is allowed
to appear ; then the boiling is allowed to go much
quicker than in the former case, and the result is a
uniform very small grain.

The centrifugal machine requires no great explanation.
Drums with perforated walls spin round at great speed.
The boiled mass, carefully mixed and stirred in a vessel
commanding the centrifugals, is run into them ; the
syrup flies off through the perforated wall of the drum,
and is caught and carried away from the outside of the

72 SUGAR

drum, as a second syrup, to be boiled again into a second
product, or perhaps to be taken back into the next
boiling of the same pan to form part of what, by
courtesy, is still called " first products." This is a
very important modification in these latter days which
must presently be explained.

The stage of finished crystallized sugar is thus rapidly
attained. If it is " centrifugal," that is, a kind of
superior raw sugar for the use of refiners, it simply goes
into bags when cold, is weighed off, and ready for
shipment. White crystals, and " granulated " — white
crystals with a very small grain — are carefully dried
before bagging. Granulated is dried in a heated revolv-
ing cylinder. The process is simple and rapid, and
the sugar is soon ready for the bag.

The only matters requiring notice are the after-
products. They used to be considerable, but their
quantity is gradually becoming smaller, and, therefore,
less important. In Java, where the practice is to take
syrups back into the pan, thus swelling the quantity
of so-called first products, the low black final product
is very small in amount. In some countries the second
products are so good in grain and colour that they fetch
a satisfactory price in the market. The beetroot
factories often turn out an excellent second product,
much sought after by the refiner.

A new method of dealing with the after products jof
the factory is now much employed. In boiling a viscous,
impure, second syrup, it is not possible to produce
in the pan as much grain as the syrup is capable of
forming. But if the masse-cuite, after it leaves the pan,
be subjected to a quiet stirring motion the portion of
the syrup which was unable, owing to the inert state
of the mass, to crystallize in the pan, will begin to deposit
a further amount of sugar in the crystalline form, not

74 SUGAR

by making new crystals but by building up the crystals
already existing in the mass. This has been called
" crystallization in motion." The same process may
be applied to the so-called first-product, which has been
boiled not only from pure juice but also, at the end of
the boiling, with an admixture of second syrup. This
addition makes the masse-cuite, at the end of the opera-
tion, more viscous than it otherwise would be ; but the
process of subsequent stirring helps the viscous syrup
to deposit more sugar on the grains, and the result is
a good imitation of a genuine first product.

The scientific explanation of this method of adding
a less pure syrup to the pan nearly full of a first product
masse-cuite is worth a moment's attention. As long
as the boiling, and, therefore, evaporation, of the
crystallized mass in the pan continues, the " mother
liquor " in which it moves should continue to deposit
fresh sugar on the crystals. But the time comes when
the mass is so dense that it is impossible to continue
the crystallization, That is the time to introduce some
second syrup, that is, the "mother liquor" from the
previous masse-cuite, which has been thrown off in the
centrifugal machine. This at once makes the dense
mass of sugar in the pan more fluid, and enables the
deposition of sugar on the crystals to begin again. This
further crystallization comes not only from " the mother
liquor " in the pan but also from that brought in from
the centrifugal machines. The subsequent stirring in
the apparatus for promoting crystallization-in-motion
adds still more sugar to the grains of crystal, and thus
the second syrup is induced to yield a considerable
quantity of its sugar in the form of good first product.
It looks as if this could only be carried on up to a certain
point ; but that difficulty can be got over by doing
it in two stages. A small quantity of juice is boiled

CRYSTALLIZATION 75

to masse-cuite and mixed in the pan with as much of
the now nearly exhausted second syrup as will reduce
the purity of the " mother liquor " to the desired point.
The mass is boiled to a high concentration, let out into
the coolers and cooled in motion down to a fixed tem-
perature for a considerable period — several days.
The subsequent curing of this in the centrifugal gives
a sugar equal to first product " in quality and appear-
ance," and a syrup which is practically exhausted
molasses. Dr. Prinsen Geerligs, the eminent Java
expert, gives very full details of this most important
new departure in the science of sugar production. He
declares that, if well conducted, this system will get rid
every day of the same quantity of exhausted molasses
as enters the factory in the juice in the form of impurities
and non-saccharine matter. Those who are sanguine
of the result of this new process look forward to the
time when there will be only two products of the factory
— first products and molasses.

This brings us to molasses, and to some interesting
points with regard to it. In places like Jamaica and
Demerara, celebrated for their rum, there is no question
what to do with the molasses, it goes to the distillery
and is made into rum. The sale of rum in these countries
is an important item in the account. The receipts from
that product can be credited in the final account so as
to show a very much lower cost of sugar production.
But where rum is not made it becomes a great problem,
in cane sugar countries, what to do with the molasses.
In some beetroot countries it goes to the ordinary
distiller. In Germany it goes to special factories which
extract the sugar from it by chemical processes, and
actually produce white sugar as their final product.
These factories produce in this way about 100,000 tons
of sugar a year, which is credited to Germany as part

76 SUGAR

of her yield of sugar from the roots. In beetroot
sugar there is no glucose, but in the molasses there is
some invert sugar, the product of injury to the syrup
during the manufacture. The reason why there is
molasses is the presence of salts. The theory is that
these salts prevent a certain quantity of sugar from
crystallizing, and that is the sugar which is held in sus-
pension by the salts in the final syrup, called exhausted
molasses. It was much discussed, some fifty years
ago, what this melassigenic power, as the French called
it, amounted to. The theoretical figure was that one
per cent, of ash prevented 3-5 per cent, of sugar from
crystallizing. But practically the figure 5 has been
adopted as the coefficient. A raw beetroot sugar which
contains, by the polariscope, 94 per cent, of sugar,
and 1-2 per cent, of ash, as determined by incinerating
a weighed portion of the sugar, moistened with sulphuric
acid, in a platinum dish, is estimated to yield 94—
(1 -2x5) = 88 per cent, of pure sugar. Beetroot sugar
is now bought and sold on this basis of 88 per cent,
net analysis, as ascertained by this system, the invoice
price being raised or lowered, per degree or fraction
of degree, according to the actual analysis of the sugar
delivered. On the other hand, cane sugar is bought
and sold, basis 96 polarization, that is the actual quantity
of sugar, as determined by the polariscope, contained
in the raw " centrifugal " sugar. And, in the same
way, muscovado sugar is sold, basis 89 polarization ;
the degrees, up and down, being charged or allowed
for in the invoice of the actual sugar delivered.

Cane juice contains a certain quantity of glucose,
and this is increased during the manufacture. At one
time it was thought that the presence of this glucose,
as it may be called roughly, prevented a certain quantity
of sugar from crystallizing. This has been shown, by

CRYSTALLIZATION 77

Dr. Prinsen Geerligs, to be erroneous. He also shows
that a subsequent theory, that the crystallization is
prevented by the viscosity of the molasses, is also
unsound. His present theory is that there is a chemical
combination of the sugar (sucrose) with other constituents
in the molasses, forming very soluble bodies, much
more soluble than the sucrose or those other constituents
when existing in their separate forms. For instance,
a solution of common salt dissolves more sucrose
than the water contained in the solution would do.
Dubrunfaut, a French sugar expert of the middle of
the last century, first pointed this out, and many in-
vestigations were made at that time as to the melassi-
genic power of various salts. But the new theory
of a chemical combination of salts with the sucrose
leads to somewhat different conclusions. The solu-
bility of the constituents is regulated by the solubility
of their combinations, and not by the solubility of the
bodies in their uncombined state. On the other hand,
the presence of glucose does not make the sucrose more
soluble. Its presence is found actually to decrease
the solubility of sucrose in the presence of salts ; that is
to say that, where glucose and salts are present in the
solution, the amount of sucrose crystallizing out increases
.in proportion as the liquid contains more glucose for
the same amount of salts.

This is a rather long story, but it is worth putting
on record as a definite explanation of the formation of
exhausted molasses, hitherto more or less a mystery, but
now clearly defined by Dr. Prinsen Geerligs' laborious
investigations. He gives seventy-seven analyses of
Java molasses with most elaborate details. Finally,
he defines an " ideal molasses as a compound of
sucrose, salts and water in the approximate proportions
of 55, 25 and 20," and " a factory molasses as a syrupy

78 SUGAR

compound of sucrose, glucose and fructose, in varying
proportions, in combination with organic and inorganic
salts, and holding in solution or suspension gummy
and nitrogenous matter, silica, iron and calcium
phosphates and other similar bodies."

The use of molasses as a cattle food is making good
progress. Mr. Hughes discovered that a mixture of
molasses with the pith of the sugar cane produced a
substance of a dry mealy consistency which could be
transported to consuming countries in bags without
losing its dry character. It has been named " Molas-
cuit " — rather a far-fetched and not very attractive
word — and is well worth a trial by the dairy farmer.
It contains 75 per cent, of good sweet West Indian
cane sugar molasses, and 25 per cent, of the dry cellular
tissue of the sugar cane, a very nourishing mixture.

In many countries it is difficult to know what to do
with the molasses. They have tried it in the boiler
furnaces mixed with megass, but it forms masses of
coke which choke the bars, and sometimes even combines
with the silica of the cane and forms a sort of glass or
slag which makes a worse stoppage. But if special
furnaces»are made it is found that the molasses, blown
in the form of a spray, makes very good fuel. Another
use for it is to spread it over the fields and plough it in.

A word or two as to the chemical control of sugar
factories and refineries must not be omitted. In these
days of scientific perfection, as the only alternative
to " going to the wall," this is absolutely essential.
In a refinery, the quantity of pure sugar entering the
refinery in the form of raw sugar must be compared
with the quantity of pure sugar leaving it, whether
in the form of pure sugar or of yellow sugars, or shut
up in the treacle or golden syrup. Then the value
of the unit of pure sugar brought in can be compared

CRYSTALLIZATION 79

with that contained in each product going out ; thus
the profit on each class of sugar produced can be defined
and compared to a nicety — a very valuable bit of
information. The syrup at each stage of the operations
should also be examined in order to ensure uniformity
of work. Coal and charcoal must be watched in the
same way, and so must scums, charcoal washings and
such-like matters. In a cane sugar factory all this
must be done, but it is much more difficult. An accurate
knowledge of how much sugar enters in the form of
cane is almost impossible. Even to weigh the cane
accurately is an arduous task ; and even then it varies
in quality so constantly from day to day that any
estimate can, at the best, be only approximate. Never-
theless it is done, and very fair figures are given, in
good factories, of sugar coming in, going out, and lost.
Cane, megass, juice, masse-cuite, syrups, molasses,
waste waters and finished sugars are all weighed or
measured, and analysed. The beetroot factories were
the first to show the necessity for all these things, and
the best way to do them. Cane sugar has learned the
lesson, and so have the sugar refiners.

CHAPTER VII

SUGAR REFINING

WE have seen how sugar production, whether cane or
beet, grew from small beginnings and primitive processes
into the great and highly scientific industry of to-day.
Sugar refining has also grown in the same way, but it
has also been so much modified from time to time,
and so much adapted to the varying requirements of
different classes of consumers, that its progress has not
been so definitely in the same direction as is the case
with cane or beet sugar production.

Sixty years ago sugar refining here was much the
same as sugar refining in other countries. But very
soon the English and Scottish refiners began to use a
much lower raw material than their continental neigh-
bours, and this involved different methods and different
results. The essential characteristic of sugar refining, as
distinguished from the processes involved in producing
sugar from the juice of the cane or the beetroot, is the
use, in small or large quantities, of animal charcoal;
that is, charcoal made from bones, for decolorizing
sugar solutions. The foreign refiners deal with a very
high class of raw material, and, therefore, require only
a very small quantity of charcoal for filtering their
sugar solutions. In Paris, for instance, the greater
part of the raw material is white sugar and, consequently,
charcoal is only used in a very small way. In Russia
the refiners use nothing but white sugar, and make
nothing but loaf sugar, the only form in which sugar is
consumed in that country. The process of sugar
refining is, therefore, in that country mere child's play.

80

SUGAR REFINING 81

But still it is very well done, as also in Paris and other
continental countries, especially Holland.

In this country, on the other hand, the refiner dealt
at one time with very low, brown sugars, from Brazil,
Manilla, India, even China occasionally, and also with
the excellent medium class of muscovado sugar from
our West Indian colonies. To refine these sugars large
quantities of charcoal were used, a certain proportion
of pure white sugar was turned out, and the rest was
yellow sugar, greatly in demand as a cheaper form for
consumption among the larger class of the population.
This was as it should be, and the yellow sugar produced
was a very superior article of its kind, and quite unique
in the sugar refining industries of Europe. It was,
and still is, a speciality of the British market. The
American refiners have learned their lesson from us,
and make all kinds for all classes of consumers.

This clearly shows that in studying the art of sugar
refining we have to examine two separate industries.
Our refiners, working the lower class of sugar, and turn-
ing out a considerable percentage of yellow sugar,
were content, in the first place, to dissolve the sugar
in " melting pans " armed with stirrers, and to run
the solution through bags to catch some of the impurities.
The clear liquor then went on to the charcoal filters:
large, vertical, cylindrical vessels packed with animal
charcoal. The liquor, entering brown, came out white
at first, then pale yellow, then darker yellow. Numbers
of these vessels, containing tons of charcoal, had to be
used for the purpose. As soon as the colour of the
liquor from the charcoal had deteriorated to a certain
point the charcoal cistern was washed out, and the
charcoal went to the kilns to be reburned in order to
restore to it the power of absorbing colouring matters
and other impurities. The liquor was ready for the

82 SUGAR

vacuum pan, and the crystallization and subsequent
" curing " of the masse-cuite in the centrifugal machines
was carried out as already described. The syrups
were filtered again and produced, in conjunction with a
certain quantity of the lower coloured liquor, the yellow
sugars. Roughly described, this was the practice in
most British refineries, except those few which made
loaf sugar. Mr. James Duncan, the greatest British
refiner in the sixties and seventies, in conjunction
with his partners in Greenock, hit upon the happy idea
of boiling the yellow sugars at a very low temperature,
and thus producing a much finer article with a delicate
primrose tint, and holding within its granular structure
much more syrup than yellow sugars had previously
contained. The sugar fetched a much higher price,
and the process enabled the refiner to turn out very
little treacle, in some cases none at all. This again was
a new departure entirely unique and practised only
in British refineries. The United States refineries
have followed our example, but on the Continent no
such sugar is known— sugar for the People is in no
demand there. Mr. Duncan introduced the new method
to London by building a large refinery on the banks of
the Thames, and was king of the industry for many
years.

The great fault committed by British refiners was
entirely to ignore the value of a defecation process to
precede the bag-filtering of the raw brown liquor. They
threw the whole burden of the work on the filter bags
and the charcoal. Then came the new king of the
sugar refiners, the late Sir Henry Tate. He saw the
point and looked for some good process of defecation.
He found it in the discovery of Boivin and Loiseau,
of Paris, and did not hesitate for a moment. He
had been working on the Scotch system in Liverpool ;

84 SUGAR

he handed his house over to the Frenchmen, substituted
French for English machinery, and at once made his
fortune. He got a great increase in the percentage
of white sugar and reduced the use of charcoal to such
an extent that his loss of weight — an important item
in the cost of refining — -was reduced to a minimum.

Since then other methods for defecating the raw
sugar before filtration have been introduced, lime and
phosphoric acid, for instance, creating a precipitate
which carries down with it the gummy and albuminous
impurities of the sugar.

But we were learning other useful lessons from our
continental neighbours. They not only purified their
raw liquor before filtering but also purified their raw
sugar before melting. The raw sugar was mixed in a
stirring machine with syrup, and then went to a regiment
of centrifugal machines above the melting floor, where
the crystals of the raw sugar were separated from the
syrup and impurities which surrounded them. Here
again was a system which resulted in the production
of a larger percentage of white sugar. In this country
the resulting syrup from this preliminary washing
would be filtered over charcoal, and boiled into fine
yellow sugars. In the continental refineries it was
boiled into a good raw sugar which, in its turn, was
dried in centrifugal machines and went to the melting
pan.

This is only a rough picture of the different methods
in different countries, but it is sufficient to indicate in
outline the varying ways of refining sugar, and how
the demands of the consumer are supplied, whether
those demands come from our millions, who consume
annually 95 Ibs. per head, or from those countries who
do not consume half that quantity.

In the present day white sugar has become so cheap

SUGAR REFINING 85

that the million do not demand so much low-priced
yellow sugar as they used to do. The consequence is
that the British refiner finds it well to use a higher
class of raw sugar. For some forty years, up to the
outbreak of war, he had an abundant supply of good,
strong, and fairly clean raw beetroot sugar, and that is
what he has lived upon. So much so in fact, that at
one time there were only one or two refineries in the
Kingdom who could guarantee that their sugar was
" Pure Cane." As far as this country was concerned,
beetroot had established pretty nearly a monopoly.

The reader may perhaps wish to know how the
Scottish refiners managed to boil their yellow sugars
at a low temperature. The vacuum pan has already
been described, but the method of condensing the vapour
rising from the boiling sugar has not been given in detail.
It used to be done by interposing a jet of cold water
in the course of the wide pipe which goes from the neck
of the pan to the air pump. This condensed the vapour
and thus helped to increase the vacuum. The air
pump took away the water of this condenser as well
as the condensed vapour. This pan would boil at
about 160° F. But to boil at 140° F required a much
better vacuum. This meant that the pan and its con-
nections must be very air-tight — that is, very well
made — that the air pump must be very powerful, and
that the condensing power must be greatly increased.
This was done by making a condenser with a vertical
pipe the length of a column of water held up in a vacuum
tube by the pressure of the atmosphere. Under these
conditions a larger condenser could receive a plentiful
flow of cold water, because the water would flow away
down the pipe instead of through the air pump. The
water was scattered about the inside of the condenser
in such a way as to present the largest possible surface

86 SUGAR

of cold water to the hot steam. The condensation
was, therefore, rapid and thorough, and the vacuum
greatly increased. With these pans they could boil
easily at 140° F. or even lower, the boiling went much
faster, less steam was necessary, and the product was
quite a different article. Even the syrup which sur-
rounded the grains of sugar was of a delicate primrose
hue instead of a dirty dull yellow. This has now been
brought to such perfection that some of the soft yellow
sugars are nearly white.

As to the lower yellows, they are not much wanted
now, and, therefore, a new method is adopted in some
refineries with regard to that stage of the refining
process. Instead of going to the expense of boiling
and curing these sugars, the syrup from which they
would have been made is transformed into " invert
sugar " and becomes a " golden syrup " of very superior
quality and great beauty. It is of the palest golden
tinge and perfectly bright and transparent, so trans-
parent, in fact, that if served up in a cut glass dish the
pattern on the bottom of the dish shines out even more
brightly than if it only contained water.

There is also a very large sugar refining industry
devoted to the production of " invert sugar " for the
brewers. The processes of purification are carried out
just as strictly as in ordinary sugar refining, perhaps,
even more so, and then the whole mass of sugar solution
is changed into invert sugar, and becomes a clear, bright
syrup, very sweet, and just in fit state for the brewer.

The sugar loaf has disappeared in this country, and
" Cube sugar " has taken its place — a very excellent
improvement, the only objection being that if you seek
in the sugar basin for a smaller lump you have difficulty
in finding it. The production of the old sugar loaf
was a long, tedious, and expensive operation. The

SUGAR REFINING 87

boiled mass from the pan was filled into the loaf moulds.
When the mass had set firmly the moulds were hoisted
to an upper floor where they stood to drain off the
" green syrup." There had to be many floors to accom-
modate these regiments of loaves. When the syrup
had drained off, a white saturated solution of pure sugar
was poured on to the face of each mould, and this opera-
tion was repeated until the loaf became white from top
to bottom — a work of some days. The fine syrup from
this washing was kept separate from the green syrup as it
contained more sugar. The loaves were then knocked
out of their moulds and trimmed up, and then came
more hand labour in putting them in the stove, a heated
chamber running from top to bottom of the tall factory
and with doors opening into each floor. Those loaves
which had already become dry had also to be handed
out of the stoves — nice warm work — neatly enveloped
in paper ready for delivery, and stacked up in the
warehouse till called for.

Compare with this long and laborious process the
making of cube sugar. For the loaf mould are sub-
stituted moulds made to fit into the circumference of
a large and very strong centrifugal machine. They
are divided by plates into a series of narrow chambers
the thickness of a cube, and the full depth of the mould.
The boiled mass from the pan is run into these moulds
and, when the mass has solidified, the moulds are ranged
round the inner circumference of the centrifugal machines
which quickly throw off the green syrup. The white
liquor is then applied, and immediately thrown off,
and, behold ! the moulds contain large, flat, narrow
slabs of white sugar. These slabs are ranged on carriers
which travel up through a heated chamber, and come
down again dried in a few minutes. They go to the
cutting machine where guillotine knives cut them up

88 SUGAR

into cubes ready to be packed in boxes and delivered
to the buyer. The name of Eugen Langen, of Cologne,
the inventor, ought to be immortalized. He was the
inventor not only of this great revolution in sugar
refining but also of the gas engine. Thus we see that our
ideas come not always from our own brains but from
those of the Frenchman and the German. It would be
possible to describe others which came from the Belgian
and the Austrian, but this is enough. To see Langen's
beetroot sugar factory at Elsdorf turning out fine cube
sugar straight from the beetroot juice was a real treat
for anyone who appreciates the pleasure of seeing
things well done ; everything clean, everything tidy and
handy, no mess on the floors, and a complete chemical
control of all the operations, He used to describe any
sugar refinery devoid of these virtues as a Schweinerei
—pigsty.

CHAPTER VIII

THE CANE INDUSTRY

BEFORE reading this chapter, reference should be made
to the table in Appendix I, which gives the production
of cane sugar throughout the world — country by country
—for the last three years, together with the estimates
for the year 1917-18. This table includes the some-
what imaginary figure" of 2,626,000 tons as the produc-
tion of British India. It is unfortunate that this figure
should now be included in the statistics, making com-
parison with former years misleading and erroneous.
The official estimate of the Indian sugar crop is based
on an estimate of the number of acres planted, and
assumes that an acre will produce 1-25 tons of sugar.
But it is well known that a quantity of sugar cane is
consumed in the form of cane ; it is also known that
the production of sugar in India is of a very primitive
kind, and that the sugar produced contains not much
more than 50 per cent, of extractable pure sugar. This
sugar, in the raw state, is consumed locally by the
peasants, and has no relation to the modern kind of
sugar imported into India for the consumption of the
upper classes. The inclusion of this purely native pro-
duction in our annual statistics of the world's supplies
is, therefore, unnecessary and misleading. It has
already led to our present statisticians pointing to the
remarkable increase in the world's production of cane
sugar at a particular period, forgetting, or not knowing,
that the apparent sudden increase at that time was
caused by the sudden inclusion of a vague estimate of
India's production. This discrepancy can be detected
in the table given in Appendix III.

89

90 SUGAR

We will take the countries in their order and say a
few words about some of them.

Louisiana is a country not absolutely tropical. They
have occasional frosts. In spite of drawbacks the
industry is carried on now in a very scientific way and
with good energy and perseverance, but it would find
it difficult to compete with more favoured districts if
left to free competition. It is, luckily, one of the United
States, and, therefore, its sugar enters the markets of
the United States free of duty, which at present is a
nice little bonus of about 5s. 6d. per cwt. Concentra-
tion of work in Louisiana has been extensive. Small
factories have given place to large ones, imperfect work
has made way for modern improvements. Before the
Civil War, the production reached, in 1861-62,
235,856 tons. During the war it fell, in 1864-5, to
5,331 tons, and did not show much recovery till 1878-9,
when it reached 100,000 tons. In 1893-4 it got
up to its old level, 250,000 to 300,000 tons. In 1904-5
it had the exceptionally large crop of 355,530 tons.
The preferential position of the States, Territories, and
Protectorates of the United States in the home market
has already been explained in Chapter II. The effect
of this stimulant, in bringing fresh capital into the
industry, was so striking that it soon became evident
that before many years elapsed the United States
would receive all its sugar supplies from these sources.
This forecast came true in 1915, as shown in Appendix XI.
This is a remarkable instance of the effect of preferential
duties in attracting capital and thus enabling a country
to be independent of outside supplies. Louisiana was
not, like the others, stimulated to increase her produc-
tion, but she was kept alive by the preference. That
so old established an industry should have kept pace
with the times shows that it deserves to be kept alive.

THE CANE INDUSTRY 91

Porto Rico, in 1898 annexed by the United States,
has now free entry into those markets ; and, as it
enjoys the advantages of a really tropical climate and
good soil, it is increasing its production very rapidly,
which also means putting in all the latest improve-
ments and doing everything on a large scale. The
planters have been investigating matters in Java and
Hawaii, being ambitious to get something like the same
yields of sugar to the acre. They declare that already
their agriculture is superior to that of Cuba. Porto
Rico's remarkable progress under preferential treat-
ment is a sufficient object lesson how to attract capital
to a home industry. American, British, and French
capital poured in, and we see the result. In the Spanish
days, Porto Rico's crop was round about 50,000 tons
of muscovado sugar. In 1901-2 it rose to 82,000 tons ;
in 1903-4 to 130,000 tons ; in 1908-9 to 258,000 tons ;
and in 1916-17 to 448,567 tons — fine centrifugal raw
sugar polarizing 96 and above. This remarkable
increase will continue. Irrigation is being carried out
on a large scale, bringing in large tracts of new land.
Labour is plentiful and cheap, and there is nothing to
complain of in the climate or the land. This object
lesson is not confined to the selfish interests of the
country concerned, it confers a world-wide benefit —
more land cultivated and more food for the people.
We now know, to our cost, that the opposite policy —
laisser-faire — means less land cultivated and less food
for the people.

The Hawaiian or Sandwich Islands have enjoyed a
duty free market in the United States for many years
and have enormously developed their industry. They
grow immense weights of cane to the acre, and as they
extract the sugar well their production of sugar to the
acre exceeds even the remarkable figure now attained

92 SUGAR

in Java. The cultivation is mostly carried on with
irrigation and, no doubt, the thing is done in first-class
style. They are now millionaires in that happy land.
In 1857 the islands produced 313 tons of sugar, and had
increased, in 1876, to 11,640 tons. The reciprocity
treaty of 1876 admitted " Sandwich Islands sugars "
into the United States free of duty. But it was the
annexation to the United States, in 1898, that gave the
finishing touch to the feeling of confidence in the future.
That year the crop was 229,414 tons ; since then it has
more than doubled. Perfection in machinery, cultiva-
tion and irrigation have done the rest. In 1907 two of
the four islands produced an average of 5' 6 tons of sugar
to the acre. A third got an average yield of about
four tons. Hawaii, the largest, was content with the
excellent yield of 2-7 tons to the acre. Dr. Prinsen
Geerligs tells us that the quality of the cane surpasses
that of any other cane-growing country. The juice is
the richest and the purest. The cane contains fre-
quently from 16 to 17 per cent, of sugar. The cane
mills, as well as the rest of the machinery, are the best
that can be had, and they succeed in obtaining 95 per
cent, of the sugar in the cane. The sugar yield on 100
of cane is extremely high. Yields of 12J, 13, even
14 per cent, are quoted, the average being over 12J.
These figures are unsurpassed elsewhere. This is
another and still more striking example of what can
be done when capital is attracted to an industry by
preferential treatment. Its progress since 1910 shows
further large expansion. In 1910 the crop was
463,000 tons ; in 1916-17 it was 579,302 tons. The
only trouble is scarcity of labour.

Cuba is the place on which the eyes of the sugar world
are now constantly fixed. The preference enjoyed by
Cuba in the* markets of the United States is only

THE CANE INDUSTRY 93

20 per cent, of the duty, but this has been enough to
give a great impetus to its sugar production. American
capitalists have been attracted even by this modest
bonus, and are exploiting the large and fertile island
very thoroughly. Cuba, before the revolution and the
subsequent American war with Spain, managed to get
up to a million tons of sugar a year ; but during her
troubles the crop fell off to a comparatively insignificant
figure. In 1897 it was under 300,000 tons, but in
1903 had recovered to 1,003,873 tons. Then the pre-
ference in United States' markets began to tell rapidly.
In 1909 the crop was 1,521,818 tons ; in 1913 it reached
2,428,537 tons ; in 1916, with another great jump, it
reached 3,007,915 tons. The crop of the following year
was correctly estimated at over 3,500,000 tons, but
rebellion in the Eastern provinces destroyed the odd
500,000 tons. This wonderful and unparalleled increase
in production is an instructive instance of the virtue of
even a small and reasonable preference in stimulating
the investment of capital in industrial production for
the permanent benefit of the country — both producers
and consumers. Cuba is undoubtedly the queen of
cane sugar-producing countries, though Java runs her
very close. Perhaps the most striking point in the
Cuban sugar industry is the size of some of her factories.
A few hundred tons of sugar used to be considered a
fair or even large out-turn for a sugar factory in the
tropics, but now we find in Cuba, as shown in
Appendix VII, that the majority of the factories turn
out from 10,000 to 100,000 tons of sugar per factory in
the season. One effect of the enormous crop of sugar
in Cuba has been that the rush of sugar to New York
during the heaviest part of crop time has frequently
depressed prices far below European parity — a curious
instance of preferential duties being a benefit even to

94 SUGAR

the consumer. The crop now beginning to be reaped
is estimated in some quarters at 3,620,000 tons.

The British West Indies and British Guiana were very-
hard hit by the beetroot competition, and in some of
them sugar has given place to other industries. Bar-
badoes still holds its own, but is now substituting
modern factories and centrifugal sugars for the good
grocery muscovado kinds for which it was once so
celebrated. Trinidad makes some very good sugar,
and will go ahead now that unfair competition has
been stopped ; so will Demerara, a British sugar colony
which has for long been in the first rank as a producer
of choice sugar. Larger factories are now being erected
in many of the islands. The first were in the islands
of Trinidad, Antigua, and St. Lucia ; presently there
will be several in Jamaica. There is now one in St.
Kitts. The machinery is first-class and comes from
British makers, who are now very up to date and know
everything that is to be known about modern sugar
production. The revival of the industry in our oldest
colonies is a matter for much congratulation, especially
when it brings a large increase of work for British
engineers.

Before leaving the subject of our West Indian
Colonies, something more must be said about their
condition before and since the great fall in the price
of sugar in 1884-5, caused entirely by the over-pro-
duction of European bounty-fed sugar. Barbadoes and
Trinidad seem to have held their ground fairly well :
the first on account of the popularity of its fine grocery
muscovado sugar and of its syrup, its good soil and
climate, and its large population ; the second on account
of its very good soil, its prosperity in other respects,
and its fairly well-equipped factories, which ought, how-
ever, to get a better yield of sugar per 100 of cane than

THE CANE INDUSTRY 95

they do now. The islands of Grenada, St. Vincent,
and Dominica seem almost to have abandoned the
crop, and Jamaica to have considerably reduced it.
This last island is of special interest to those who, like
the present writer, recollect its fine muscovado sugar
in the good old days before the flood of bounty-fed
sugar set in. The sugar produced by Jamaica was,
from the point of view of the British refiner, very
superior to any other raw muscovado sugar, except
perhaps that from St. Kitts. The juice must have
been very pure to produce such sugar, or else the
method of manufacture must have been very superior.
But now Jamaica is going to launch out into the modern
central factory system and to produce the usual " centri-
fugal sugar, basis 96 polarization." The island's pro-
duction used to range from 25,000 to 35,000 tons.
After the great fall in price in 1884-5, it gradually
dwindled down to 18,000 to 20,000 tons. Its future
progress will be interesting.

The French West Indies were once in the first rank,
but they have not kept pace with the times. They
were at one time well equipped, but now their
machinery, especially in the evaporating department,
is out of date. They have for a very long time turned
out a kind of white sugar, the kind for which there is
a demand from the refiners in France. Their working
expenses are high, and labour is scarce and indolent.
They stand still at a production of about 30,000 to
40,000 tons from each island.

The small French island of Reunion, a neighbour of
Mauritius, suffers from want of labour. If that could
be obtained, the industry would flourish.

The island of St. Domingo seems to be progressing,
though not favoured with any artificial stimulus.
They made 60,000 tons in 1907-S, 80,000 tons in 1908-9,

96 SUGAR

and 90,000 tons in 1909-10. Since then, as may be
seen in Appendix I, the production has increased to
130,000 tons in 1917, and is still increasing. The
factories, mostly American, are modern, but not up
to date. The great trouble is political unrest.

Mexico is doing well and putting up some first-class
factories. They get long prices in their own markets,
thanks to an excessive Customs barrier, and do not yet
make much of a surplus for export. Here, again,
political unrest is the great trouble. The production
increased rapidly from 75,000 tons in 1900 to 160,000
tons in 1911. Since then, internal quarrels have
reduced the sugar production to 50,000 tons. With
peace at home, sugar production will flourish and
increase rapidly.

Peru, Brazil and the Argentine are producers on a
fairly large scale, but parts of Brazil are sadly behind
the times. They can get very good prices at home
when they make no surplus, but when they are obliged
to export they find it difficult to keep up home prices.
They tried to form a combination for that purpose but
it broke down. The country could produce a very large
crop if it were not that capital and labour are wanting.
There are, however, several modern factories in Brazil,
trying to reform the industry.

Peru has a great future if all goes well. Irrigation,
combined with good soil and climate, and canes which
produce rich pure juice, only require up-to-date fac-
tories to enable Peru to compete with Java and Hawaii
in the amount of sugar produced per acre. The rich
land between the mountains and the sea, coupled with
the valleys and streams which run from the hills to
the coast, give a perfect arrangement for universal
irrigation. The climate is almost rainless, so there is
no variety of season, and sugar can be produced and

98 SUGAR

reaped all the year round. It takes nearly two years
in this dry climate for the canes to mature. There
are many good factories, but the machinery is not
powerful enough yet to get a large yield from the canes.
The production of canes per acre is large, and 3 tons
of sugar per acre represents at present about the
average yield. In 1894 Peru produced 74,000 tons of
sugar ; in 1904, 156,000 tons ; in 1914, 262,000 tons.
Previous to 1894 the industry suffered greatly from the
European bounty-fed competition, and from war and
revolution. Labour is sufficient ; all that is necessary
for good progress is political rest and some encourage-
ment to the investment of fresh capital in the industry.

Argentina has a heavily protected home market, and
is not likely to become an exporter owing to high cost
of production.

British India is supposed to produce the official figure
stated in the list, but production is so primitive and
.scattered that it must be difficult to arrive at any definite
estimate. It is satisfactory to read, in a recent official
report, that " steady efforts are being made by the
Agricultural Departments to improve the cultivation
and the processes of extracting cane juice and of sugar
manufacture." India, in spite of her large home pro-
duction, is a considerable importer from Mauritius,
Java, and even Europe.

Java is a superb instance of success, the result of
individual energy and intelligence stimulated only by
science and organization. But the island has one
advantage which is not always to be found in the tropics,
plentiful, good and cheap labour. They have always made
the finest raw sugar in the world, but now they have
added to this a considerable production of white sugar,
for which they find a constantly increasing demand in
British India where it competes with our old sugar colony

THE CANE INDUSTRY 99

of Mauritius, and where it is gradually supplanting
the quantities of European beetroot " granulated "
which were for many years " dumped " in India.

Dr. Prinsen Geerligs said seven years ago that the
increase in the Java crop would go on at the rate of
50,000 tons a year till it reached 1,600,000 tons.1 At
one time the Government limited the production in order
that sufficient rice and other crops might be grown to
feed the people. But since then more land has come
under irrigation and continues to do so. This irrigation
is now almost universal, and the water from the rivers
deposits a fertilizing slime which furnishes sufficient
potash and phosphoric acid to the soil. As the cane
crop is alternated with rice or other food crops it gets
the full benefit of this fertilizing deposit. When the
" Sereh " disease threatened destruction to the canes
in 1902 cuttings were imported and the " Sereh " was
stamped out. Seedling canes were also raised and
selected varieties propagated and cross-fertilized, until
at last Java has arrived at the remarkable product of
42 tons of canes to the acre, as the average for the whole
island.

The increase in the production of sugar per acre is
most remarkable. The accurate figures given by Dr.
Prinsen Geerligs show that in 1893-4 the average pro-
duction was 2-812 tons (of 2,240 Ib.) per acre, quite a
remarkable figure in those days. In 1897-8 it had
increased to 3-571 tons ; in 1903-4 to 4-058 tons ;
and in 1910-11 to 4-302 tons. The only country that
can beat that figure at present is Hawaii. Dr. Prinsen
Geerligs does not now put any limit to his anticipation
of the further progress of the industry. The produc-
tion per acre is still rising ; cultivation, the selection of

1 In 1916-17 Java produced 1,596,174 tons, and the crop
1917-18 is estimated at 1,800,000 tons.

100 SUGAR

the right kinds of cane for different soils, improved
methods and greater rapidity in juice extraction and
treatment, all contribute to this result. The work of
cross-fertilization in finding new varieties of cane goes
on with redoubled ardour and promises great things
in the future. Increase of cane crop coupled with
increased richness is what they aim at. It is found
that increased quantity of juice in the cane is always
accompanied by increased purity of the juice. More
juice gives more sugar, and increased purity gives still
more sugar. The area in Java, moreover, which will
be devoted to sugar goes on increasing. For some
time it stood still, because other crops were regarded
by the Government as essential to the well-being of the
population, but now there is permitted a greater
expansion. Fresh ground is being prepared every-
where for the cane crops, together with new systems
of irrigation, so that eventually more arable land will
be available for the sugar manufacturers, who are quite
ready to absorb it. In Dr. Prinsen Geerligs' opinion,
therefore, there is every expectation of a steady and
perhaps sudden extension of the Java sugar industry.

The history of the sugar industry in Formosa and its
probable future have already been described and
explained in sufficient detail in Chapter II.

The Philippine Islands are now under the wing of the
United States, and the American Government has
ordained that 300,000 tons from that country shall
be admitted free of duty into the United States
markets. Under ordinary circumstances the result
would be that American capitalists would exploit
this new field for enterprise, erect monster factories,
as they have done in Cuba and Hawaii, and create
another vast centre of sugar production. But the
interest of the United States' own sugar industries in

THE CANE INDUSTRY :

Louisiana and in the beetroot districts of the North
had to be considered, and it was decided that the
preference must be confined to the produce of existing
factories, mostly in native hands, and thus the hope
for the investment of capital in the new venture was
for the moment checked. But now, American capital-
ists have acquired large tracts of land for the purpose
of sugar production on an extensive scale.

Dr. Prinsen Geerligs says : "As regards the prospect
of the cane-sugar industry in the Philippine Islands,
all forebodings point to gigantic progress in the near
future."

In Australia a good deal of sugar is produced in
Queensland and a little in New South Wales. The
refusal to allow coloured labour to work in the tropical
parts of Queensland is a serious drawback to any
extension in that direction. In the present sugar-
growing districts, where white labour is possible, it is
found to be expensive and in other ways difficult.
There has been a good deal of Government control,
which adds sometimes to the difficulties of the industry.
The cost of production is high, and therefore requires
liberal preferential treatment to enable producers to
make both ends meet. Central factories are now
universal, but the cane planting leaves much to be
desired. The industry began in a small way in 1864,
and by 1883-4, 152 factories produced 36,000 tons
of sugar. In 1910-11, 54 factories produced 207,000
tons. The production is about 2 tons to the acre.

New South Wales produces an average of about
20,000 tons. The total production of Australia in
1914-15 was 246,408 tons.

Our old sugar-producing colony of Mauritius has
had many struggles. They made splendid sugar in the
old days, only beaten by Java for quality. They do

8— (1463)

102

SUGAR

still better now because they make a large quantity of
white sugar for the Indian market. But machinery
which was at one time superior at last became anti-
quated. Then came low prices, and a great disaster
followed. The whole of the cattle were suddenly
destroyed by a terrible disease. This deprived them,
at one stroke, of their only means of haulage. This,
coupled with a destructive cyclone, brought them to
the verge of despair. They wanted money for light
railways to draw the canes to the mill, and if they did
not get it their crop would be lost. The Colonial Office
came to the rescue just in time and the danger was
averted. Then prices improved, hope began to revive,
what the French call concentration of work was car-
ried out, old small factories were closed and large
" centrals " established, and they began to breathe again.
Irrigation is to be carried out on a large scale, the rail-
ways are to be improved, factories are now working
on modern lines and things begin to hum. Labour is
a difficulty, as with our colonies in the west, and it would
be well if capital were more abundant, but, barring
cyclones, prospects are good. Labour was originally
imported from India, but as the Indians settled down
permanently as small planters imported labour became
unnecessary. Their production of cane per acre is,
however, very inferior to the out-turn of the large
planters. The average richness of the cane is a little
under 14 per cent., and the yield in the factory about
10'5 per cent. The average crop of cane per acre
(30 tons plant and 20 tons ratoon) is about 23 tons,
including the inferior crop of the small Indian planter.
The canes take from twelve to twenty-two months to
ripen, according to the climate of the district. From
1884 to 1897 the crop varied from 100,000 to 150,000
tons. From 1898 to 1912 it ranged from 150,000 to

THE CANE INDUSTRY 103

250,000 tons. In 1914-15 it reached 277,164 tons.
Sixty years ago we imported large quantities of
Mauritius sugar ; but when the European bounties
were in full operation Mauritius only sent a very small
quantity to Europe, mostly after-products. 1 India
now imports annually 100,000 to 150,000 tons of white
Mauritius sugar. During the war, Mauritius has come
to the rescue by supplying us with some of her excel-
lent white sugar. Considering the troubles she suffered
during the bounty competition, we ought to have been
sufficiently grateful to give her, at all events, the full
market value. 2

1 European imports fell to 7,000 tons, but recovered to
50,000 tons after the abolition of the bounties.

2 In 1915 (war time), Mauritius sent us 111,875 tons of
raw sugar and 85,118 tons of refined.

CHAPTER IX

THE BEET INDUSTRY

WHETHER the sugar cane came originally from the East
and was carried from one country to another till at last
it arrived in the Western Hemisphere, or whether it
was indigenous on both sides of the world cannot be
definitely decided, but there is little doubt that it was
carried from China to India and Arabia, and afterwards
introduced by the Arabians into Persia, Africa and
Spain. It was the Spaniards who started its cultiva-
tion in the West Indies and America. India is said to
have produced sugar as early as the seventh century
— a rare and costly article in those days.

The date of the first production of sugar from the
beetroot, on the other hand, is very definite. A
German chemist, Marggraf, in the year 1747, was the
first to call attention to the fact that the juice of the
beetroot contained sugar identical in composition and
properties with cane sugar. But it was not till 1799
that this discovery was put to practical proof on a
working scale. A pupil, or follower of Marggraf,
Francis Karl Archard, invented at that time a method
of extracting sugar from the beetroot. Great interest
was taken in this idea for a new agricultural industry,
and the King of Prussia gave substantial help in the
erection of the first beetroot sugar factory in Silesia.
Other factories followed, not only in Prussia but also in
Bohemia. In 1811 France took up the new industry
and from France it spread to other countries. Bona-
parte gave it a great impetus, seeing at once the advan-
tage of producing sugar at home, and voted large sums

104

THE BEET INDUSTRY 105

of money and considerable tracts of land for the encour-
agement of the new manufacture. The blockade had
raised sugar to famine prices, so the new French factories
flourished. Forty were in operation in 1812 and pro-
duced about 10,000 tons of sugar. But when the
blockade was raised the price fell and the new venture
had a bad time. About 1830 there was a fall in the price
of corn and the farmers turned again to sugar beet.
By the year 1854 Europe produced something under
200,000 tons of beet sugar. Ten years later the figure
went up to over 500,000 tons. In 1871 it exceeded a
million tons. Ten years later it was approaching two
millions. The cane sugar industry saw itself seriously
threatened. The fear turned out to be well founded.
The time came when half, and even two-thirds, of the
visible sugar production of the world (not reckoning
the then unknown production of India) was produced,
not from the sugar cane but from the sugar beet.

The way in which this enormous production grew
and prospered is a most interesting study. It is dealt
with in detail in the writer's paper on " The Statistical
Aspect of the Sugar Question," which can be found, for
those who may desire the full facts, in the journal of
the Royal Statistical Society for June, 1899. Here
there is room only for the more salient points.

To begin with a comparison between the progress of
France and Germany in the production of beetroot
sugar — an instructive chapter in a very remarkable
story. In 1871, France was the leader in the industry ;
she produced 284,444 tons, while Germany produced
only 186,442 tons. But while the German Government,
as is their practice, began to foster the industry in a
far-seeing and rational way, the French Government
allowed their great agricultural and industrial sugar
producers to shift for themselves. The German

106 SUGAR

producer was charged with his sugar tax in the form of
a duty on the weight of the roots. The roots were esti-
mated to yield a certain percentage of sugar, and were
charged accordingly. This was — and was intended to be
— a strong incentive to the farmers to grow richer roots,
and to the factory to get more sugar out of them. The
system, as usual in Germany, was a great success. The
roots grew richer every year and the machinery for
extracting and completing the sugar was constantly
improved. Scientific methods progressed and nourished
because they brought larger profits to both farmer and
manufacturer. In France, on the other hand, the
factories were under the strictest excise supervision,
every ounce of sugar was checked and noted, and had
to pay the full sugar duty.

The result of these two opposite systems was that
while France produced no more in 1884 than she had
done in 1871, the German production had gone up from
186,000 tons to 1,123,000 tons. The French producers
saw that this meant ruin if allowed to continue. The
percentage of sugar extracted from the roots had gone
up in Germany from 8*28 per cent, to 11 per cent.,
while in France it remained at the old figure, below
6 per cent. The French Government at last realized
their mistake and hastened, in 1884, to rectify it by
imitating Germany. They adopted the system of duty
on the roots, and it was a duty based, of course, on a
very low estimate of yield. The effect was instantaneous.
Better seed was sown in France, better methods of
manufacture were . adopted, the diffusion process was
substituted for the old hydraulic presses, and the yield
of sugar began to rise by leaps and bounds. From
6 per cent, it soon went to 7, 8, 9 and 10 per cent. But
as the French producers were allowed the full drawback
on exportation, although they were paying only a small

THE BEET INDUSTRY 107

fraction of the duty on the sugar they produced, the
revenue began to show a great and constantly increasing
loss. The French Government, unlike the German,
had greatly overdone the dose of stimulant, and they
had to proceed to take precautions. They found that
the sugar industry was making an enormous profit
out of the new system. In the first year the manu-
facturers pocketed 25,000,000, francs; in the third
year, 1886-7, their profit had risen to 91,966,437 francs,
or £3,678,657. These are official figures. The Govern-
ment were obliged to check this drain on the Exchequer.
In 1887 the legal yield was raised, and the excess yield,
instead of going free of duty, was charged with a modified
tax. For two years the large profits were slightly
reduced, but in 1889 they were again over 90,000,000
francs. There was then another raising of the legal
yield and the profit was again reduced, but began to
recover as the yield of the factories went on increasing.
In 1893 it was 39,000,000 francs, but in 1896 it had
reached 54,000,000 francs. During this period, 1884
to 1896, the yield of sugar from the roots had gone up
from 6 per cent, to 11 per cent., and the French crop
had increased from 265,000 tons to 668,000 tons.

Turning again to Germany, the yield of sugar from
the roots, which was, in 1871, 8*28 per cent., had risen
by 1884 to 11 per cent. They had thus got more than
ten years start of their French competitors. But in
1896, when the French managed to reach a yield of
11 per cent, the Germans had reached a yield of 12*66
per cent.

It must be borne in mind that in Germany, as in
France, though the duty only struck a portion of the
sugar produced, the full drawback was allowed on all
the sugar exported. This was an enormous incentive
to production and exportation and a serious loss to the

108 SUGAR

revenue. The German Government saw that their
wise and moderate system had about done its work.
In 1888 they took steps gradually to make a transition
from the system of duty on the roots to the evidently
more rational method of charging the duty on the sugar
actually produced. In 1892 this period of probation
was accomplished, the factories were under full excise
supervision and all the sugar paid the duty. But the
German Government were wide awake to what was
going on in France, so they presented the manufac-
turers with a temporary direct bonus on exportation,
which was to be abolished as soon as France and other
countries ceased to give direct or indirect help to their
sugar producers out of the revenue. Here again the
German Government were quite wise and reasonable.

The French Government followed suit in 1897 ; but
again they made a mistake in overdoing it. They
abolished the duty on the roots and levied it, very
properly, on the actual sugar. But instead of coming
to terms, in conformity with the German friendly
overtures, they disregarded the invitation and gave a
bonus on exportation just double that of Germany.
This, as the French Minister said, was a defiance and a
challenge.

The German production had now increased tol,821,223
tons, nearly three times that of France. Their revenue
from sugar had gone down from 63,249,000 marks in
1875 to 33,624,000 marks in 1886, and 14,677,000 marks
in 1887. Then they began their reforms and the revenue
recovered to an average of about 76,000,000 marks in
the years 1889-92. After that the full duty on all the
sugar was secured, and the revenue went up to 84, 92
and 99,000,000 of marks for the next three years. The
stimulus had done its work, for not only had the German
production gone up to nearly 2,000,000 tons but their

THE BEET INDUSTRY 109

exports of refined sugar, which were 5,809 tons in 1871,
had reached, in 1888. when the reforms began, 150,341
tons, and in 1892, when the reforms were completed,
270,607 tons. The direct bonus on export, which was
then substituted as a temporary measure, brought the
exports of refined sugar up to 503,928 tons in 1897.
The German exports of raw sugar were 491,176 tons in
1883, and remained much the same till 1894, when they
rose to 609,662 tons ; in 1896 they were 760,657 tons.
This is a striking picture of the progress of an industry
under a judicious paternal Government.

France was injudicious, but Austria was still more so ;
and yet their system laid the foundation for an enormous
and flourishing industry. The Austrian sugar duty
was levied in a peculiar way. It professed to be a duty
on the roots, but instead of a careful weighing of the
roots, as in Germany, the quantity of roots was roughly
estimated according to an official supposition of the
capacity of the apparatus of the factory. It was, in fact,
an estimate within an estimate. The Austrian manu-
facturers were, therefore, not only stimulated to grow
rich roots and to get the utmost quantity of sugar out
of them, but also to make the apparatus of the factory
capable of working more roots than were estimated by
the Government. When the present writer visited the
Austrian engineering works in 1871 he found them full
to overflowing with work for the sugar factories, making,
among other things, diffusion vessels which should turn
out more juice per day than those then in use. There
were also, in those days, some factories still working with
hydraulic presses. They were a curious sight. The
work was carried on at such high pressure speed, in
order to do more than the estimated quantity, that the
place was a perfect pandemonium, and the floor covered
with juice owing to the hurry and bustle of the

110 SUGAR

establishment. The Austrian Government were losing
revenue to such an extent that it seemed probable that
they would soon cease to receive anything from the sugar
duty. This proved to be only too true. In 1867 the
net revenue was 5,363,159 florins. By 1874 it had
dropped to 1,742,324 florins, and in 1875, while the gross
revenue was 9,337,435 florins, the drawback allowed on
exports amounted to 9,472,991 florins, so that the sugar
duty produced an actual loss to the Exchequer of
135,556 florins. They remedied this disastrous state
of things by insisting on a fixed minimum revenue
with a gradual yearly increase. This checked the
exports to a certain extent and the manufacturers
loudly complained. In 1888, therefore, the whole
system was abolished and the duty was levied on the
actual sugar produced. The Government followed
the example of Germany and gave a temporary direct
bonus on exports, to be abolished when a general agree-
ment with the other countries should be arranged.
The manufacturers enjoyed the certainty of 9,000,000
florins per annum and were satisfied. The stimulus
to production continued and exports rapidly increased.

Belgium and Holland levied the duty neither on the
sugar nor on the roots but on the density of the juice.
No one knows how much the manufacturers made out
of this, because neither the quantity of sugar pro-
duced nor the quantity consumed has ever been
discovered.

Russia desired to have a flourishing beetroot sugar
industry, and after many vicissitudes hit upon a system
which thoroughly answered the purpose of giving the
necessary stimulus. The Russian Government, in 1894,
took the matter into their own hands. They fixed
(1) the quantity of sugar necessary for home consump-
tion ; (2) the maximum price to be charged to the

112 SUGAR

c onsumer, a price, after deducting the duty, about double
the price in outside markets ; (3) the quantity of sugar to
be kept in reserve, a portion of which was to be thrown
on the market if prices rose above the fixed limit. Each
manufacturer was allowed to send into consumption
a fixed quantity of sugar, and then his surplus produc-
tion was apportioned to the home market in proportion
to his total production. Here was not only a security
for good profits in the home market but also a constant
stimulus to over-production. Fortunately the Russian
consumption, in spite of the high price, steadily
increases, owing to the constant extension of the Empire
eastwards. But at times there is a large surplus to
be got rid of, which has to be thrown on the outside
markets and sold, for what it will fetch. The high price
at home maintains even then, for the Russian producer,
a large average profit far beyond the natural level.
This is, in fact, a " Combine " or " Cartel," established
and regulated, not by the industry but by the Govern-
ment, and strictly supervised by them. The details
have been modified from time to time, but the main
features remain. The production in Russia was 159,000
tons in 1875, 475,000 tons in 1885, 679,000 tons in 1895,
1,127,000 tons in 1909-10, and exceeded 2,000,000 tons
in the two following years. The year before the war,
Russia produced 1,750,000 tons, but by 1916-17 the
production had fallen to 1,160,000 tons.

During the war the production in Germany, Austria,
and France has fallen considerably, as shown in
Appendix II.

Turning~to the exports from Germany and Austria,
the former exported, in 1875, 7,245 tons of refined sugar,
and, in 1897, 503,928 tons. Austria in 1875, exported
39,887 tons of refined sugar, and, in 1897, 460,154 tons.
The raw sugar exports in 1883 were, from France 42,236

THE BEET INDUSTRY 113

tons, from Germany 491,176 tons, and from Austria
131,019 tons. From that year Germany kept up a
steady export varying between 400,000 and 700,000
tons per annum. The French exports were very fluc-
tuating, as low as 3,000 and as high as 300,000 tons.
Austria was also very fluctuating, as high as 180,000 and
as low as 31,000 tons. The exports of refined sugar
from Austria are very high and very steady, because
the profit from the duty or the bonus was so arranged
as to give the turn to the production and exportation of
refined rather than raw sugar.

This rough sketch of the progress of the European
beetroot sugar industry gives rise to many reflections.
It has been artificially stimulated, as we see, to a vast
extent, and it has now lost its artificial stimulus. The
Brussels Convention of 1903 has put a stop to it. During
its progress it won the race against cane sugar and became
the dominant factor in the sugar markets of the world.
What will happen now ? Will it hold its own or will
cane sugar win the next heat ? x

To answer this question it is necessary to study the
cost of production in the rival industries. The yield of
beetroot sugar, per acre, is only one-and-a-half to two
tons at the best. From the cane, in very favoured
countries, as we have seen, the yield per acre can reach
four to five tons. Then, as to skill and excellence in
manufacture, the beetroot factories were at one time
far in advance of the cane. The tropical industry has
now learned the lesson from its European competitors,
has improved its methods and goes on doing so very
rapidly. But the European industry has its market
almost at its doors, while the tropical sugar must
sometimes travel long voyages to reach the consumer.

As to actual figures, it is sufficient to say here that

1 See Appendix III.

1 14 SUGAR

in the most advanced beetroot country, Germany, the
average cost of production is about 9s. to 9s. 6d. per
cwt. But Russia, which produces less than a ton to
the acre, must have a considerably higher figure. The
other countries come between the two. In a first-class
cane sugar country, like Java or Cuba, the cost of pro-
duction might often be a good deal more than a shilling
below the cost in Germany. One conclusion can easily
be stated. The European producers will continue to
make as much sugar as their consumers want so long as
competition from outside is excluded. Whether they
can maintain their exports on the present scale is
doubtful.

The reader may wonder why the United Kingdom,
by far the largest sugar consumer in Europe, is the
only European country which produces no sugar even
for its own vast consumption. The story which has just
been told of the European sugar industry is a sufficient
answer. As Mr. Robert Lowe told us years ago, ours
is not a paternal Government. With a market for
1 ,600,000 tons of sugar at our doors, and a good soil and
climate, we import it all and read the sugar market
report day by day under the cheerful heading of
" Foreign Produce." Germany, in the meantime, with
a home demand, in 1901-2, of about 800,000 tons,
not only supplied all her own sugar, but had, every
year, more than a million tons for exportation, half of
which was refined sugar. These are curious facts, of
which the general public, and even our rulers, know
little and care less.1

Since the abolition of the bounties, Germany's con-
sumption has risen to 1,600,000 tons, but she continued
to export a million tons.

1 The production of beetroot sugar in Europe from 1909-10
to 1913-14 is given in Appendix II. The increase or decrease
for each country from 1903-4 to 1913-14 is given in Appendix IV.

THE BEET INDUSTRY 115

The United States, after a few unsuccessful efforts
in former days, began, in 1890, seriously to embark
in the industry of beetroot sugar production. Clever
men made a careful study, in the European countries,
of the methods of manufacture ; the Department of
Agriculture, and especially Dr. Wiley, the chief of its
Bureau of Chemistry, rendered valuable advice, and the
small beginning soon grew to large dimensions. In
1892 there were six factories, turning out 13,000 tons
of sugar. In 1902 there were forty-one factories, with
a total sugar production of 218,406 tons. In the
season 1908-9, sixty-three factories produced 421,244
tons. In 1912-13, seventy-three factories produced
769,507 tons, expressed as raw sugar. The industry
enjoys, like its sister cane sugar industry in Louisiana,
the profitable privilege of entry to the home markets
duty free. At present the agricultural branch of the
industry is not a great success, their average weight of
roots to the acre being only 8 to 10 tons. The manu-
facturing department, no doubt, includes many up-tc-
date factories, and the results will probably improve
steadily year by year. Up to 1902-3, the extraction
of sugar from the roots had increased from 114 per cent,
to 12-8 per cent. In 1910-11 it was 14 per cent., and,
in 1913-14, 14-4 per cent. Why the farmers do their
part of the work so badly is not explained. In many
parts, no doubt, the climate is not so favourable as it
is in Europe. The industry is, however, very sanguine
with regard, to the future, and we can only wish them
every success in their brave determination to grow and
prosper.

Canada is beginning to make her appearance in
statistics as a sugar-producing country on a small scale.
The history of her attempts to produce beetroot sugar
is instructive and a warning. It is very much the

1 16 SUGAR

experience of the United States over again. In 1881
the first attempt was made. We are told in a recent
Report that the experiments then made could not prove
anything but a failure. In 1901, four factories were
started, but suffered from the usual initial drawbacks :
insufficient beet acreage and incompetent factory
management. The farmers were, of course, inexperi-
enced and discontented with the price paid for the
roots. The consequence was that one factory was
moved to the States ; another gave up the attempt ;
and the two remaining combined, in 1909, to form the
present " Dominion Sugar Company, Limited." The
two drawbacks were gradually overcome. The farmer
began to recognize the benefits to be derived from the
crop ; and it became " a known fact that, once inter-
ested in beet-raising, he very rarely discontinues."
The farmer appreciates the fact that it is a cash crop.
Prices have now been arranged on the basis of richness
of the roots and, in fourteen years, prices have risen
from $3-50 to $5-50 per ton. No farmer now receives
less than $5-50, which shows that he knows how to
produce rich roots. Twenty-three shillings a ton is a
good price to begin with. The Canadians have now
learned the details of the factory work, and can dis-
pense with incompetent imported " experts." It is
good to hear that the Dominion Company are now
completing the erection of a large beet-sugar factory
to do 1,500 tons of roots a day. " The plant is one of
the most complete in the world, equipped with the most
modern machinery and appliances that science has
devised." The Company has evidently learned its
lesson and is ready to "achieve success. It would be
well if some equally intelligent Company were to make
its long wished-for appearance in our rural districts.

CHAPTER X

COMPETITION

THE remarkable and sudden growth of the beetroot
sugar industry, as related in the last chapter, was
stimulated in every possible way, first by a quiet, unseen
but well-known system of under-estimate of the duty
to be levied, coupled with full payment of drawback
on exportation ; and afterwards by the payment of a
direct bonus on exportation. All this the reader must
have thoroughly realized from the facts just described.
He must now be led, for a moment, a step further back
in the history, to a time in the early sixties when the
beetroot industry was still in its youth and the dominant
factor in the European sugar markets was the refiner.
We made all our own refined sugar in those days and were
quite happy. But our comfortable times were to be
rudely disturbed. An invitation was addressed to the
British Government to join France, Belgium and Hol-
land in an International Conference on the sugar duties.
The refiners here got no benefit from the duty and were,
therefore, quite willing to have the matter discussed.
It was not very clear why the other countries should
desire us to join them in reforming their own tariffs.
To judge from the result it would almost seem as if they
brought us into the discussion in order to get our duties
altered. If so, they were entirely successful. Our
Government did exactly what they wanted, and kindly
did it even in advance of the international agreement.
This may have been magnanimity but can hardly be
regarded as good business. It would have been better
to wait and see how the terms of the Convention were

117

9— f 1 4&S)

118 SUGAR

carried out. However, it was signed and ratified in
1864, and the only result, so far as this country was
concerned, was a constantly increasing supply of loaf
sugar from France and Holland. In five or six years
the competition became serious. Many of the London
loaf sugar refiners retired from business. The rest
began to look into the matter and soon found out the
cause of this alarming invasion. According to the
terms of the Convention the duties on raw sugar were to
be levied according to the colour of the sugar. There
were three or four classes, paying different rates of duty,
the brownest sugar in the lowest class, and so on up to
the finest in the first class. The system worked quite
fairly in this country, where the refiners used great
varieties of raw sugar from all parts of the world. But
in Paris the refiners were beginning to use the raw beet-
root sugar, the quality of which was not accurately
indicated by the colour. They could get sugar classed
as yielding only eighty per cent, of refined which in
reality yielded ninety per cent. In France the duty
was very high and, therefore, the profit on ten per cent,
of sugar escaping the duty was very large. The full
drawback was allowed on exportation and, therefore, the
refiner naturally got the full duty from the home con-
sumer. He, therefore, got a profit of ten per cent, of
the duty on the whole of his production. After the
Franco-German War, the duty was greatly increased
and so was the refiner's profit.

In 1872 our markets were, consequently, flooded with
loaf sugar from Paris. A general meeting of British
refiners, at which every firm in the kingdom was repre-
sented, was held in London, and a Committee was
appointed to deal with the subject and induce the
Government to obtain a rectification of this gross abuse
of the terms of the Convention. The Committee set to

COMPETITION lid

work with a will, but they little knew that they were
entering upon a thirty years' struggle, of which they
only saw a small beginning at that time.

The Foreign Office took the matter up very willingly.
It was a complicated subject, but they gradually learned
their lesson and did their best. Some of the refiners
began to add diplomacy to their other labours and the
contest went merrily on. There were despatches and
counter-despatches without end, but the foreigners were
too clever for us.

The refiners, however, found very. useful allies in a
most unexpected quarter. The French beetroot sugar
producers, as related in the last chapter, were under
stringent excise supervision and had to pay duty on
every ounce of their sugar. If anyone in France ought
to have been allowed to " get a pull " out of the duty
it was the beneficent agricultural industry of sugar
production, not the three or four millionaire sugar refiners
in Paris. The country manufacturers were naturally
jealous of the favours enjoyed in Paris which they were
not allowed to share, and they also saw that large
exports of loaf sugar to England robbed them of good
customers there and made them more dependent on the
Paris monopoly. They, therefore, threw themselves into
the fight with great spirit and considerable success.
Members of the National Assembly were enlisted on their
side and the abuses were well exposed by eloquent
speakers.

The remedy proposed by the British refiners, and
backed up by their French friends, was that the refin-
eries should be under the same excise supervision as
the beetroot factories. If the refined sugar was made
" in bond," that is, without any duty having been paid,
then the portion which went for export would require
no payment of drawback, and that which went for

120 SUGAR

home consumption would pay the full duty on leaving
the refinery. The cure was absolute and easy. A
system which worked without difficulty in hundreds of
beetroot factories could be very easily worked in three
or four refineries. The arguments were put before the
National Assembly with great ability and a law was
actually voted for putting the refineries under excise
supervision and thus getting the full duty on the
sugar actually produced and paying no drawback on
exportation.

This was a great triumph, and success appeared
to be more than probable. Our Government urged
the matter very steadily, an International Conference
was held in Brussels in 1875, followed by two
more in Paris in 1876 and 1877. But the foreign
delegates stubbornly resisted. They proposed a com-
promise. " Saccharimetry," they said, would be a
sufficient remedy. All sugar entering the refinery
should be analysed and the duty levied accordingly.
The British delegates, very properly, had no faith in
this proposal as a sufficient security against clever
manipulations, and held their ground firmly. The
French Government shelved the Bill voted by the
National Assembly for " refining in bond," and showed
no great desire to protect their revenue. The Paris
refiners were too strong and won the battle. There was
only one British loaf sugar refiner left.

During this initial phase of the coming struggle the
British Refiners' Committee induced the West India
Committee to join hands with them. The West Indians
saw that every ton of foreign refined sugar imported
displaced an equivalent quantity of their raw sugar.
It was also pointed out that new abuses, as described
in the last chapter, were making their appearance in
Germany and Austria, and that very soon raw beetroot

COMPETITION 121

sugar, enjoying the extra profit derived from a vicious
system of levying the duty, would be invading British
markets on terms with which no cane sugar producer
could compete. This turned out to be only too true.
Not only raw but also refined sugar from Germany and
Austria began to pour in, the quantity increasing
rapidly from year to year.

The two industries of British refining and Colonial
sugar production demanded that a Select Committee
of the House of Commons should be appointed to examine
the whole question. Mr. Ritchie, then member for the
Tower Hamlets, obtained the Committee and presided
over it with great ability for two years, 1879 and 1880.
The inquiry was carried out thoroughly and was in every
way — except practical effect — a great success.

The foreign delegates at the various conferences had
pointed out, in view of what was going on in Germany
and Austria, that it would be quite impossible for their
Governments to agree to any Convention for the aboli-
tion of these artificial aids to foreign manufacturers
unless the British Government would give them security,
by a clause in the Convention, that they should no
longer have to compete in British markets with sugar
receiving similar advantages from other foreign Govern-
ments. This was such a reasonable and necessary
demand that it could not be disputed or disregarded.
If a foreign producer receives from his Government
some gift out of the revenue which enables him to sell
his produce below cost price and yet make a good
profit, it is not only reasonable and consistent with
common sense but also absolutely necessary, if British
industry is to survive, that such a direct attack on our
industries should be warded off by some defensive
action. The amount of the artificial profit thus obtained
could, in the case of sugar, be very accurately defined,

122 SUGAR

and therefore it would be easy to countervail it by an
equivalent duty. The sugar would then enter our
markets on equal terms with its British or other com-
petitors. The benefit it received from its Government
would be put into our Exchequer for the relief of the
British tax-payer, and everyone would start fair. It
would be a tax on foreign Government bonuses, not a
tax on sugar.

This was the argument, and it was met, not with
argument but with violent indignation and heated con-
troversy. The discussion got warmer the longer it
proceeded, but the warmth was all on the part of the
opponents of a countervailing duty, while its advocates
were quite cool and stuck to a pure economic and scien-
tific statement of their case. They had many suppor-
ters among real political economists, and a great army
of unreasoning opponents whose sole cry was that
duty should be levied for revenue purposes only. The
case of sugar was sufficient to show how erroneous that
curious dogma really was. The Select Committee saw
this at once, and the more the witnesses were cross-
examined by the dogmatic party the more clear their
case became. The Committee reported in favour of a
countervailing duty. The minority issued a report,
which was defeated by 7 to 5. Of the five who
abstained, four were probably in favour of the Com-
mittee's Report. The Report was agreed to without
a division.

It would require many chapters to give a full history
of this interesting controversy which raged for many
years. It suffices to say that in the end many opponents
were converted. In 1899 the Indian Government could
no longer endure the serious injury to our Indian sugar
industry inflicted by the hundreds of thousands of tons
of Austrian and German refined sugar which were

COMPETITION 123

" dumped " there when European markets were glutted
with the artificially stimulated over-production in those
countries. A scale of countervailing duties was drawn
up in India and submitted to Parliament in the Indian
Tariff Bill of 1899. A great debate took place, and Mr.
Chamberlain made an eloquent and convincing speech,
in which he stated the whole case in favour of the duties
with remarkable clearness and force. He challenged
the House to establish once for all the principle of a
duty to countervail such a foreign artificially stimulated
competition as this, and the House supported him by
a large majority. This was four years before his great
pronouncement in 1903. Again, Sir Robert Giffen, who
as one of the Government experts had fought valiantly
against the sugar industries in his evidence before the
Select Committee in 1879-80, made the following hand-
some recantation at a meeting of the Royal Statistical
Society in 1902. Speaking of his evidence in 1879, he
said that " he was not sure that he would have taken
the same line if he had been able to look forward a
quarter of a century and see what the result was to be
of allowing these bounties to continue. People became
wiser as time went on, and a good many of the assump-
tions which it was perhaps legitimate to make a quarter
of a century ago had been falsified by events . . . but,
having had a quarter of a century's more experience,
he was satisfied that these bounties must be treated as a
great infraction of free trade, and that all the countries
affected by them were quite entitled to take exceptional
measures to put an end to them. . . Whatever we
might gain temporarily in consequence of what foreign
countries gave us by these bounties, they were not to be
endured, and we should join in this general movement
in favour of free trade."

The Report of the Committee fell dead, and the

124 SUGAR

question, so far as diplomacy was concerned, slumbered
more or less for several years. In 1880 the Government
made a feeble effort to reopen negotiations, but were
met at once, very properly, by the French Government,
who pointed out that they could not consider the matter
until the British Government were prepared to give the
contracting parties security that they should not have
to compete in British markets with sugar receiving
similar advantages in other countries.

In 1888 an International Conference met in London
and included Germany and Austria. But, though a
Convention was more or less agreed to by the contracting
parties, its presentation in the House of Commons for
ratification was met by one or two speeches which might
easily have been answered, but which apparently so
frightened the Government that they promptly with-
drew the Bill. Great Britain had, on this occasion, to
bear the obloquy of rejecting the Convention.

The controversy raged fiercely at that time. The
dogmatists had fallen back on the argument that the
sale of goods below cost price was such a blessing to the
consumer that it was wicked to attempt to stop it.
They failed to see that if industries are injured by such
competition the consumer also suffers. Production is
reduced and prices rise. This is exactly what has
happened with sugar. Very low prices have alternated
with very high prices at regular intervals. As the late
Lord Farrer pointed out, glut is followed by collapse
and ruin. The short-sighted dogmatists declare, on the
other hand, that they do not mind this ; they welcome
ruinous prices as they do sunshine.

Another ten years elapsed, the competition among
the various beetroot sugar producing countries had
become more and more keen and the weaker ones began
to pine for some way of escape from such an artificial

COMPETITION 125

state of things. Another Conference was called and
met at Brussels in 1898. The numbers had multiplied.
France, Belgium, Holland, Germany, Austria, Russia,
Spain, Sweden and Great Britain were now gathered
together and showed some real intention to make the
Conference a success. It was an interesting discussion,
but all hopes of success were wrecked by Russia. It
was agreed that the Russian system was a flagrant case
of unfair advantages conferred by the Government on
their sugar industry, with the effect of artificially
stimulating production and disturbing the natural
course of competition. Russia indignantly denied the
imputation and the Conference broke up.

At that date Germany exported 760,000 tons of raw
sugar and 426,000 tons of refined. Austria exported
377,000 tons of refined, and Hungary 40,000 tons.
The average yearly exports from Russia for the period
1885-95 had been 72,000 tons, practically all refined
sugar. In 1896 the Russian exports went up to 221,000
tons. An interesting foot-note to the Belgian table of
(so-called) statistics says : " The figures relating to the
production of sugar are approximative, the duty being
based on a presumed yield." This is evidently the case,
for on adding the production and imports for 1897 we
get the figure of 222,185 tons, while we find the total
exports amount to 236,027 tons, leaving a minus
quantity for home consumption.

CHAPTER XI

DIPLOMACY

THE United States Government were not going to
allow their sugar industries to be ruined by the artificial
system of forcing production and exportation, now
almost universal throughout the European beetroot
industry. They were very happy to import the sugar,
but it must leave its artificial advantages at the Custom
House as it passed through. The practical result of
this policy was that not only tens but hundreds of
thousands of tons of superfluous European beetroot
sugar were imported into the States without hurting
anybody, while the American revenue was swelled at
the expense of Germany and Austria. The exporters
paid the countervailing duty and were thankful to get
rid of a good part of their overburdened stocks. The
United States thus became the only market where our
West Indian sugar producers could escape from this
ruinous competition — it was their salvation. The Indian
Government followed the example of the United States
and gave the same relief to our producers in the East.

Great Britain, in the meantime, gloried in allowing
the European producer to enjoy a preferential position
in her markets. He was in exactly the same position
as if his sugar were admitted free while all other sugar
was charged with a duty. That treatment would be
rank heresy if bestowed upon British producers ; but
the other way round it was hailed with delight as the
most perfect application of the only true economic
doctrine.

Our Colonial Office began to think otherwise, and the
126

DIPLOMACY 127

Foreign Office was quite ready to co-operate in applying
some remedy to this crying injustice, rapidly becoming
a scandal. They only wanted a mandate and, fortu-
nately, they got one. The Congress of Chambers of
Commerce of the Empire met in London in 1900. The
London Chamber, with some difficulty, had been induced
to take up the sugar question and Sir Nevile Lubbock,
Chairman of the West India Committee, was entrusted
by the London Chamber with the duty of moving a
resolution at the Congress, to the effect that it was time
for an International Conference for the abolition of these
artificial stimulants to production and exportation, and
that our Government should indicate their determination
to take steps, either by means of a countervailing duty
or by prohibition, to put a stop to them. Sir Nevile
Lubbock made a most convincing speech, and was so
well backed up, not only by Sir Thomas Sutherland and
by the President, Lord Avebury, but also by many
distinguished Colonial delegates, that the resolution
was carried by a large majority.

This was exactly what the Government wanted.
Immediate steps were taken to call a fresh Conference,
which eventually met in Brussels in the winter of 1901.
This Conference was a big affair and the foreign delegates
knew that the British Government — for the first time —
meant business. It required a very large table to accom-
modate delegates representing Belgium, Austria, Hun-
gary, Germany, France, Spain, Great Britain, Italy,
Holland, Roumania and Sweden.

This Conference had to deal not only with those
abuses which were rampant in 1898 but also with a new
method of carrying out, on a still larger scale, the
process of exterminating all unaided competitors. The
manufacturers in Germany and Austria had taken a
leaf out of the Russian book and developed a new way

128 SUGAR

of fighting the French. The industry in each country
formed what is called a " Cartel." They were so similar,
and their results so identical that it will be sufficient to
describe, very briefly, the German Cartel. The consump-
tion duty, that is, the duty actually paid by the con-
sumer, was 10s. per cwt. ; but the import duty, that is,
the duty which anyone outside would have to pay in
order to enter into the competition, was 20s. per cwt. —
just double. The surtax on imports was, therefore, 10s.
per cwt. and, within the limit of that large amount, the
home producer could raise his price to the consumer
without fear of outside competition. But to effect this
it was necessary that the whole industry should com-
bine. They did so, and bound themselves down under
severe penalties to adhere to the arrangement. The
refiners were to raise the price to the consumer and to
pay the raw sugar producers a fixed share of the resulting
profit. The practical outcome was that the raw sugar
producer received 3s. 6d. per cwt. more than the outside
value of his sugar, while the refiner enjoyed the balance
of the profit — 4s. 6d. per cwt. These were, indeed,
glorious profits. The great glut of sugar was rapidly
increased, but the profit in the home market was so
large that they could afford to sell their surplus for what
it would fetch and yet make an abnormal profit on their
total out-turn. The value of sugar in the world's
markets fell 3s. per cwt. below the cost of production,
but the German producers were delighted, declaring that
the right policy was to keep prices down so as to crush
all outside competition. They very nearly succeeded.
This was regarded with dismay not only by the ordinary
unaided producer but also by the rest of the beetroot
industry itself, which had long enjoyed and still retained
the smaller benefits so generously bestowed upon them
by their paternal Governments.

130 SUGAR

This was the state of tension in which the Conference
met at Brussels, and this was the one subject for dis-
cussion— to abolish the Cartels. It was a long and
tedious process, but by the end of February, 1902, the
work was completed and all that remained was to wait
anxiously for the ratification of the Convention which
was provisionally signed on the 5th March, 1902, and
came into force on the 1st September, 1903.

The usual margin between prices of raw and refined
sugar in Germany was 3s. 6d. per cwt., but when the
Cartel was in operation it rose to 10s. 6d., and when the
Cartel was abolished by the Convention it fell again to
the normal figure. On 15th January, 1902, a calcula-
tion of the profit arising from the Cartel, based on the
prices of the day, gave the figure of 7'90 marks per fifty
kilogrammes, that is, nearly 8s. per cwt. of sugar con-
sumed. This, calculated on a consumption of 703,507
tons, showed a profit of £5,558,495 for the industry,
with which they could make contributions to those who
lost money on exports. The German Cartel profit was
sufficient to furnish a bonus of about 5s. 5d. per cwt.
on the refined exported, or 4s. lOd. per cwt. on the raw
sugar exported. The Austrian Cartel profit, calculated
in the same way, was found to amount to more than 9s.
per cwt. of sugar consumed, showing an annual Cartel
fund of £2,957,868, sufficient to furnish a bonus of
4s. 8d. per cwt. on the refined sugar exported, or 4s. 2d.
per cwt. on the raw sugar exported. In the year
ending July 31st, 1902, Austria-Hungary produced
1,171,056 tons, consumed 349,117 tons, and exported
739,186 tons. In the same year Germany produced
2,302,246 tons, consumed 743,520 tons, and exported
1,144,317 tons. Together, these two countries were
able to furnish the outside world with nearly 2,000,000
tons of sugar. They were selling it at 3s. per cwt. below

DIPLOMACY 131

the cost of production and hoped soon to become masters
of the situation.

The Convention put a stop to the Cartels by fixing
the surtax at a maximum of 2s. 6d. per cwt. This was
more than enough to keep out competition, and the
British delegates feared that a Cartel might be formed
to exploit even this reduced surtax ; but the situation
was critical, and it was better to accept the compromise.
Subsequent experience has shown that half that surtax
suffices to keep out competition. The large surtaxes,
therefore, can have had no other object than to enable
producers to raise prices in the home market. This is
why excessive surtaxes must always be regarded as a
form of State aid calculated to stimulate production
and exportation with the result of disturbing the natural
course of the world's industry and trade. There is
nothing to prevent the same system being applied to
iron, steel, cotton or woollen goods or any other article
of commerce.

The details of the Convention were summarized by
the writer in the Economic Journal (Journal of the
Royal Economic Society) for March, 1904, from which
he makes the following brief extracts.

The first Article of the Convention declares that the
contracting parties undertake to suppress direct and
indirect bounties on the production or exportation of
sugar, and proceeds to define, as follows, some instances
of the way in which such advantages may result from
State legislation.

(a) Direct bounties granted to export.

(b) Direct bounties granted to production.

(c) Total or partial exemption from taxation granted

for a part of the manufactured product.

(d) Advantages derived from excess of yield.

132 SUGAR

(e) Advantages derived from the exaggeration of the

drawback.
(/) Advantages derived from any surtax in excess of

the rate fixed by Article III.

Definition (/), inserted at the instance of the British
delegates, was absolutely essential in order to meet
the case of the Cartel bounties. They proposed to define
Cartel bounties as " advantages derived from any
surtax," but in view of the critical state of the negotia-
tions accepted the limitation. The first Article is,
therefore, so far inconsistent that, though it declares
the abolition of all bounties, it permits any Cartel
bounty which may be obtained from the reduced surtax
fixed by Article III. The figure of this surtax was,
of course, a great bone of contention, but was finally
fixed at six francs per 100 kilogrammes, that is, 2s. 6d.
per cwt.

The direct bounties in Germany, France, Austria
and Holland came under definitions (a) and (b). The
bounties defined under (c), (d) and (e) belong to one
family and are practically interdependent. Levying the
duty on an estimated yield is probably followed by the
obtaining of a yield in excess of the estimate, and conse-
quently by " a total or partial exemption from taxation
for a part of the manufactured product." But this
would not necessarily create a bounty unless the full
amount of duty were returned in drawback on export.
In that case the manufacturer can obtain the full duty
from the home consumer ; but if it were not so the
exemption from taxation would merely operate as a
reduction of duty to the consumer. Where the full
drawback is returned on export, though the full duty
has not been paid by the manufacturer, the drawback
becomes practically an exaggerated one and the bounty

DIPLOMACY 133

is really the result of a combination of the cases denned
in (c), (d) and (e).

The second Article abolishes such bounties as are
here denned by prescribing excise supervision of factories
and refineries, so that no duty shall be charged on the
estimated yield, and therefore no drawback paid on
exported sugar. The sugar will be manufactured and
refined " in bond," that is, without having paid any
duty ; drawbacks will thus be abolished, and the sugar
for home consumption will pay the duty when delivered
for that destination.

The third Article fixes the maximum surtax at six
francs per 100 kilogrammes.

The fourth Article is the penal clause, the object
of which is to give the contracting States security that
they shall not in future have to compete with bounty-fed
sugar. It declares that a duty not less than the amount
of the bounty shall be imposed in the markets of the
contracting States on sugar from all countries that
grant bounties. In the case of bounties arising from a
surtax higher than that fixed by Article III, the counter-
vailing duty shall be calculated by deducting from the
surtax the figure so fixed and taking half the difference
as representing the bounty.

These then are the salient points of the Convention :
the decision to abolish all bounties ; the establishing
of manufacturing and refining " in bond " ; the limita-
tion of the surtax ; and the security to the contracting
Powers that bounty-fed sugar will no longer be tolerated
in their respective territories.

There is one minor point in the Convention which calls
for a word of comment. The fourth Article lays down
the rules for countervailing a bounty by means of an
equivalent duty, but it adds as an alternative that the
high contracting parties reserve to themselves the power

to— (1463)

134 SUGAR

to prohibit the importation of bounty-fed sugar. This
appears to have arisen from some curious superstition
on the part of the British Government that a duty might
be regarded as contrary to the principles of free trade,
but that prohibition could not fall under that
stigma.

If this was the idea it shows a curious want of grasp
of the subject. A bounty destroys free trade in the
country which receives the bounty-fed commodity,
because the producer of that commodity is at once
placed in a position of favour as compared with his
competitors who receive no bounty. The foreign pro-
ducer is practically protected by his bounty in British
markets if his sugar is allowed to be imported in open
competition with sugar which receives no bounty. The
effect is exactly as if the bounty-fed sugar were admitted
free and the other, receiving no bounty, were struck
with a duty. To eliminate this inequality is the sole
object of the countervailing duty. It is, in fact, a duty
on bounties, not on sugar. It accepts the bounty for
the benefit of the whole nation of taxpayers by putting
it into the Treasury, and leaves the sugar to compete
with all other sugar on equal terms. Therefore, under
a system of countervailing duties we do not lose the
benefit of the bounty, we do no injustice to the bounty-
fed producer, and we save the consumer from the danger
to his interests arising from the effect of bounties in
discouraging and eventually destroying his natural
sources of supply. None of these arguments can be
used in favour of prohibition.

The Convention expired in 1908 and had to be renewed.
The British Government, generally so simple-minded
and easily over-reached, did a crafty thing. Five years
previously they had yielded to the reasonable demand
of the foreign governments who, for thirty years, had

DIPLOMACY 135

persistently urged that they could not be bound by treaty
to abolish their bounties until Great Britain undertook
that they should no longer have to compete on British
markets with bounty-fed sugar. Having at last secured
the abolition of the bounties, the British Government,
at the earliest opportunity, turned round and declared
that they were about to readmit bounty-fed sugar to
their markets. The foreign governments were in a
position of great difficulty. They had no desire to
revert to the ruinous system of former days and they
had to give in.

Russian sugar, with its bounty, was to come in without
let or hindrance. There was a great flourish of trumpets.
The system of restricted " importation " was to be
abolished. This was really all moonshine. The world
produced 14,000,000 tons of sugar, and we consumed
one million and a half. There are at least 12,000,000
tons (the rest goes to the United States) from which we
were free to make our selection. There was, therefore,
no restriction. Russia, it appears, after sending her
usual exports to Finland and Persia, had an average
surplus of about 40,000 tons, some of which might
come here. What is this drop in the ocean of
14,000,000 tons ? As it happens, Russia had then no
surplus. So much for restriction of imports.

There were loud cries, when the Convention was
coming into force in 1903, that the price of sugar would
be raised enormously. Great political economists, with
a turn for mathematics, sat down and calculated the
exact figure. Our consumption, they said, was 1 ,600,000
tons, and the bounties were £5 per ton. Multiply the
consumption by five and you get £8,000,000. Behold
the loss to the British consumer ! They were not
aware that price is governed by supply and demand
and by nothing else. But, nevertheless, the figure was

136 SUGAR

freely quoted even by statesmen of the highest rank,
and was eagerly swallowed as an indisputable fact.
They must have been quite surprised to find that supply
and demand went on governing market prices just the
same as usual, and, as there happened to be too much
sugar, prices went down instead of up. Then a most
fortunate accident happened for the alarmists. The
European beetroot crop of 1904-5 suffered from a
severe drought and produced 1,200,000 tons less sugar
than the estimate. Prices naturally rose and the
alarmists cried, "We told you so." The rise which took
place was, in fact, a clear proof of the danger to con-
sumers in having to depend on one crop, confined to a
small portion of Europe, for their supply of sugar. And
this dependence on one crop was the direct effect of the
bounties. So it was the bounties that were really the
cause of the scarcity and the high prices. Europe, of
course, sowed a large acreage in 1905, on the strength
of the good prices, and had a fine season and a bumper
crop. In August, 1905, we were back again at the old
price, a price even below the cost of production. 1
The beetroot sugar industry still keeps up its pro-
duction, and even continues to increase, but not to
such an abnormal extent as during the bounty period.
The industry has been firmly established and will
continue to flourish, but it can no longer sell for export
below cost price. Cane sugar now has a fair chance.
The figures in Appendix III show that cane sugar is
now forging ahead, and it will continue to do so,
keeping pace with the constant increase in the world's
consumption. The new fair fight between beet and
cane will be an interesting study for many years.
1 See Appendix XV.

CHAPTER XII

THE SUGAR MARKET

THERE are other sugars than the products of the cane
and the beetroot, and they must not be forgotten. The
most important is what is called, in the market, " Palmyra
Jaggery," from India, of which at one time this country
used to import appreciable quantities. Its production
appears to be a considerable industry in India. The
juice is tapped at the top of the tall palm-tree and
caught in earthen pots suspended from a grooved stick
which directs the flow of juice into its receptacle. l The
pots are collected each day and the juice boiled down
to the crystallizing point.

Another tree that produces sugar is the sugar maple
in America. Here the juice is really tapped from the
stem and boiled down into sugar. The quantity annu-
ally consumed in America is about 11,000 tons. The
people who live in the county of production tell us it is
so nice that we shall never get a chance of tasting it

Coming now to the subject of the sugar market, there
are still a select few who can recollect what the sugar
market in Mincing Lane was before the advent of beet-
root sugar, that is, in the early sixties. The West India
merchants and their brokers, together with merchants
and brokers who dealt in sugar from other quarters of
the world, were the sellers. The buyers were the
refiners and the wholesale grocers or dealers in raw

1 The tapping of the juice is often incorrectly described ; there
is no incision in the bark. The long flower is tied up and a piece
cut off at the top. The pot is tied on and juice flows into it from
the wound. It is cut again when the juice ceases to flow, and
so on from day to day.

137

138 SUGAR

grocery sugars. But these wholesale grocers had also
another market to attend, and a very important one —
the refined market. All the refined sugar consumed in
the country practically came from British refiners, so
that, in the case of London, a buyer from every whole-
sale grocer or dealer had to make a tour of the East End
early every morning to call on some twenty refiners and
buy their goods. In Mincing Lane work began at
9 a.m., public sales to value ; then a visit to every
private saleroom where West Indian sugar was on
show ; then the public sales at 1 o'clock, which often
lasted for an hour or more ; so that the industrious
buyer often did not get his work done till 3 p.m.

The Mincing Lane sugar market of to-day * is a very
different thing. The public sales are a mere nothing,
West India brokers have nearly disappeared, the advent
of the merchant at noon is a thing of the past, and you
can buy a thousand tons of sugar in five minutes. This
transformation is all the result of the beetroot sugar
industry. Beetroot came into Mincing Lane at first
in pill boxes, carried furtively by the seller in his waist-
coat pocket and shown in a deprecating way as being
a very impertinent intrusion. Only one or two refiners
would try the experiment, but they did not regret it.
In Greenock one wide-awake sugar refiner informed his
broker that he did not want to buy hundreds of tons,
he wanted to buy thousands. Here was a grand oppor-
tunity for some intelligent and enterprising foreigner to
develop a new business. He came exactly at the right
moment, and at the end of his career he was one of the
greatest sugar-brokers of the world. He not only
supplied the refiners with their raw material but,
eventually, had every kind of foreign refined ready for
the wholesale grocer. One of the oldest established

1 Before the war.

i

140 SUGAR

houses among the English sugar-brokers followed his
example, opened branches in Paris and Magdeburg, and
ran a very good race with him.

Then came a great help. Those refiners who used
beetroot sugar on a large scale soon found the want of
some organization for getting rid of the constant worry
of complaints of quality and weight in the deliveries
of the beetroot sugar they were importing. The result
was the foundation of the London Beetroot Sugar
Association. This organized body of buyers and sellers
has worked admirably. A form of contract was estab-
lished which became, eventually, a very complete and
effectual document. Every dispute is now settled by
arbitration, carried out by the Council of the Association
in a simple but efficient manner. The sugar is bought
and sold on the basis of analysis. Samples are most
carefully taken under the supervision of officers of the
Association. A portion of the sample is placed in three
sealed bottles, of which one goes to the seller, one to the
buyer, and the third to the laboratory of the Association.
If there is a serious discrepancy between buyer's and
seller's analysis the third sample is analysed by the
chemist of the Association, and the average of the two
nearest analyses is taken as the basis of the invoice.
Here is at once a system which makes the buying and
selling of sugar mere child's play. The large brokers
with their branches abroad can let you have any quantity
of sugar you desire.

The British sugar refiners now supply about 700,000
tons to our consumers, and at one time made it nearly
all from raw beetroot sugar. That indicates the quan-
tity of that commodity which we annually imported.
But the foreign refiner now supplies our consumers
with about 900,000 tons l of refined beetroot sugar every

1 This, of course, is a description of the normal state of
things immediately before war upset everything.

THE SUGAR MARKET 141

year, so that here we have 1,600,000 tons accounted for
without any of the old trouble of valuing and attending
public sales, or visiting countless private show-rooms,
at the expense of many hours of valuable time. There
only remains to be dealt with in the old-fashioned way
about 100,000 tons of grocery or miscellaneous cane
sugar, including, of course, our fine colonial produce,
such as the splendid yellow crystallized sugars from
Demerara and the West India Islands. This is the
change that has come over the Mincing Lane sugar
market since 1860.

But the change has not created a wilderness, as might
be supposed. On the contrary, the members of the sugar
market are there in swarms. This is the speculative
market, a new invention not so very long ago, but now,
in the eyes of the members, a very old affair. There is
a " Call " in the morning, another in the afternoon,
where prices fluctuate, not by 6d. per cwt. as in the old
days of real buying of solid sugar, but by farthings or
halfpennies. When the market is really active there
may even be a violent rise of a penny. All this may
seem very childish but it has its practical side. A big
bond fide sugar-broker sells a thousand tons of solid
sugar to a refiner, and he can at once cover his sale in
the market by buying a thousand tons of imaginary
sugar for delivery at once or at some future time. He is
perfectly safe, thanks to the strict organization, and if
he elects to take delivery he will get the sugar. He can
thus hedge both his purchases and his sales, and without
such a facility it would be impossible with safety to
carry on the large operations necessary for the supply of
sugar in these days. 1

There was some pleasure and satisfaction in the old
days in exercising the knowledge that comes from

1 This has disappeared in war time.

142 SUGAR

practical experience and selecting with care and skill
the best article at the lowest possible price. That part
of expert knowledge in the sugar industry has gone.
The beetroot industry is beginning to get anxious as to
its future prospects. Professor Dr. E. O. von Lippmann,
at the head of the German industry both as expert and
leader, a few years ago expressed his alarm with no
uncertain sound. He points to the rapid recovery of
cane sugar since the Brussels Convention, to its monster
factories, to its large yields of sugar to the acre, and,
worst of all, to its low cost of production. He speaks
of the cost of production in Cuba as being down to 8s.
per cwt. free on board. He has even heard of lower
figures, down to 6s. 6d. per cwt., and of a factory which
produces 78,000 tons of sugar a year. He quotes the
figures from 1904 to 1909, showing that cane sugar has
increased from 48 per cent, to 54 per cent, of the world's
production. l Going further back he shows that in 1899
cane sugar produced only 31 per cent. We know that
in those days even Java, with all its natural advantages,
great skill and knowledge, declared that it could not
stand against such artificial competition as then pre-
vailed. He went on to remind his audience how he had
urged, at that time, that the low prices were, from their
point of view, in* conformity with the interests of the
European industry. But now, he continues, better
prices contain a danger, because they are calculated
to provoke a new and notable extension of the cultiva-
tion of the sugar cane. He also laments that German
raw sugar has deteriorated in quality and that German
refined sugar has lost its reputation. They must
organize, he says, and if the industry will not take the
necessary measures it is not for want of warning.

1 He probably made the same mistake as that which is
pointed out in Appendix III.

THE SUGAR MARKET 143

This is in a very minor key. In the days when beetroot
was master he had urged that low prices must be
maintained in order to crush competition. That he
very nearly succeeded we all know, and the fact was
admitted even by such a powerful authority as The
Times. In the Financial Supplement to The Times of
December 17th, 1909, there was a leading article on
f< The Rise in Sugar," in which the writer, after some
interesting comments on the position, continued as
follows —

" But what must strike the observing man who
inquires into the facts of the situation is the probability
that but for the Brussels Convention the rise in sugar
in this country, instead of being 2s., might have been
20s. per cwt. For if the Convention had not put an
end to the bounty system on the Continent the cane
sugar industry by this time would have been practi-
cally dead, and we should have been entirely depen-
dent on the supplies of the Continental beet growers.
And it is the comparative failure of the beet harvest
this year that is the real and only cause of the rise
in sugar. ... To all intents and purposes, then,
we should be faced with a shortage of about half-a-
million tons in the European needs for sugar were it
not for the most welcome increase in the production
of cane sugar, and that increase could not and would
not have occurred under the bounty system."

The authors of the Brussels Convention were pleased
to receive this unexpected and most weighty testimonial.
For thirty years they were branded as economic infidels
and heretics, but it appeared, on this very high authority,
that their political economy was sound, that they have
done a good deed and saved a valuable industry from

144 SUGAR

destruction. A good deal of injury might have been
avoided — injury to consumer as well as producer — if
their advice had been listened to at the outset of the
disease.

As a last word, we ask again, which is to win the race
between cane and beet ? Or are they to run a dead heat
and divide the stakes ? At one time the beetroot
industry, as we have seen, was rather sad, while cane
sugar was very cheerful and " going strong." Those
connected with the latter declare that their adversary
will never hurt them now, and can only live with the
help of a surtax. This, at present, is not borne out
by the facts ; the beetroot industry shows no signs of
reducing its production. But it is quite prepared to
face the fact that, all artificial stimulus having been
withdrawn, it will not continue to make its accus-
tomed giant strides. M. Fran£ois Sachs, the eminent
Belgian expert and statistician, said, with regard to the
rapid increase in the world's consumption, and therefore
production : — " It is true that Europe, and certainly
Belgium, will take but a feeble part in this increase in
the production of the future."

Let us end with the hearty wish that both industries
may flourish, each in its own sphere ; after their splendid
efforts they both deserve it.

(From Appendix to First Edition.)

APPENDIX I

TEN REMARKABLE YEARS OF PROGRESS

Ten Years of Sugar Production in Germany

Roots

Sugar

Sugar

Year

Acres

Roots. Tons

per acre

Sugar. Tons

per 100

per acre

Tons.

of Root

Tons

1899-00

,070,355

12,466,000

11-64

1,791,250

14-37

•67

1900-1

,119,015

13,252,000

11-84

,974,800

14-90

•76

1901-2

,196,872

16,000,000

13-38

2,293,300

14-33

•92

1902-3

,069,110

11,256,000

10-54

,750,600

15-53

•63

1903-4

,042,192

12,706,000

12-16

,929,410

15-22

•85

1904-5

,037,005

10,071,000

9-70

,605,400

15-94

•54

1905-6

,179,355

15,727,000

13-34

2,394,400

15-23 ! -03

1906-7

,110,457

14,187,000

12-80

2,242,100

15-80

•02

1907-8

1,121,232

13,483,000

12-02

2,136,000

15-99

•90

1908-9

1,087,215

11,799,000

10-84

2,080,000

17-63 -91

Average

11-87

15-49

•83

Average of Ten Years, 1899-1908

Roots per

Sugar per Sugar per

Acre

cent, of Roots Acre

Tons

Tons

Germany

11-868

15-49 1-83

Austria-Hungary . 9-682

15-02 1-45

France .

.1 11-272

12-84 1-44

Russia

<

5-786

14 -81

Belgium

.

12-136

13-97 1-69

Holland

t .

10-6

14-47

1-54

Sweden

10-9

14-37

1-56

Denmark

.

11-03

13-13

1-44

APPENDIX II

Home Consumption, 1909

Foreign Refined Sugar .
British Refined Sugar
Manufactured (in Bond) in the United
Kingdom ......

Raw Cane Sugar .

145

Tons
924,521

599,793
113,582
1,637,896 Tons.

146 SUGAR

Home Consumption, 1909 — contd.
Less Exports of British Refined . . . 32,256

Total consumption of Sugar . . . 1,605,640

Molasses (imported) ..... 142,030
Molasses Manufactured (in Bond) in the ) fi7 Q7q

United Kingdom . ' . . . f

Total consumption of Molasses . . . 210,003 Tons.

APPENDIX III

RESULTS OF A GERMAN SUGAR FACTORY,
SEASON 1908-9

This is given not as i idicating the average results of beet sugar

production, but as a remarkable instance of success in a

good season.

Roots, 24,600 kilos, per hectare, equal to about 10
tons to the acre, against 10 1 tons the year before.

Roots worked, 135,959 tons ; average polarization,
17'10. Price of roots, 21s. per ton.

Working Expenses per ton of Roots

Shillings.

Coal .... 1-38

Materials . . . . -53
Lime .... -56

General Expenses . . -264
Repairs .... '58
Wages . . . .2-196
Insurance of Workmen . '176

Contributions . . . '41
Insurance . -092

Total . . 6-188
Roots . . 21-136

27-32
Depreciation . 1-07

Total cost per ton of roots . 28-39 Shillings.

APPENDIX III 147

Six tons of roots produced one ton of sugar. The
cost per ton of roots being 28' 39 shillings, the cost per
ton of sugar is 170" 34 shillings, or £8 10s., or 8s. 6d. per
cwt.

Sugar Produced

Tons

First products (average analysis, 90-25). . 20,818
Second products (average analysis, 81-52) . 1,805
Molasses 1,806

Yield per cent, of Roots

First products . . .15-31
Second products

Total . . 16-64 per cent.
Molasses . . . 1-33 ,,

Average Prices

First products, 10s. per cwt., basis 88, f.o.b.
Second products, 8s. 6d. per cwt., basis 75, f.o.b.

s. d.

Receipts for sugar . 10 6 per cwt.

Expenses . . .86 ,,

Profit . . .20

Profits, £45,076, equal to 29 per cent, on capital.

Dividend of 22 per cent, paid, after payments to
reserves and bonuses.

Of the rest, £8,669 was paid to the growers on account
of the good year and the short weight but good quality
of the roots.

Dried pulp, 2,603 tons, consumed 1,482 tons of coal,
and fetched £8,335 net, after deducting expenses of
drying.

Other factories paid 30 to 35 per cent, dividend. The
high yield of 16 to 17 per cent, of sugar from the roots
made the season a very profitable one to the factories.

APPENDIX TO FOURTH EDITION

I. — SUGAR CROPS OF THE WORLD
(Wittett & Gray, New York, October, 1917)

TONS OF 2,240 LB.

Cane Sugar

1917-18
Estimate
Tons

1916-17
Tons

1915-16
Tons

1914-15

Tons

United States —
Louisiana ....
Texas

1 275 ,000

271,339

122,768

216,696

Porto Rico .
Hawaiian Islands .
West Indies—
St. Croix .
Cuba
British West Indies-
Trinidad

475,000
525,000

15,000
3,200,000

70 ooo

448,567
579,302

, 12,000
3,000,000

70,891

431,335
529,895

14,750
3,007,915

64,231

308,178
577,i86

4,5oo
2,592,667

58,822

Barbados, exports .
Jamaica, exports
Other British Islands .
French West Indies —
Martinique, exports
Guadeloupe ....
San Domingo ....

55,000
30,000
35,ooo

40,000
40,000
i45,ooo
35 ooo

55,ooo
28,000
30,000

40,000
40,000
130,171
50 ooo

65,000
15,143
35,371

39,925
34,i"
126,058
65 ,000

32,578
15,063
24,000

38,581
39,6i7
108,267
110,000

Central America
South America —
Demerara, exports

25,000

120,000
15 ooo

25,000

120,000
15 ooo

35,ooo

116,224
13,000

36,275

113,632
12,000

Venezuela ....
Equador .....

15,000
8 ooo

15,000
8 ooo

7,000
7,567

3,ooo
7,107

250 ooo

262 841

Argentine ....
Brazil

150,000

84,069

149,299

194 ooo

335,956
240,000

Total in America

5,915,000

5,578,589

5,324,592

5,140,466

British India (consumed locally)

2,750,000
i 800 ooo

2,626,000
i 596,174

2,634,000

1,198,567

2,460,573
1,303,045

Formosa and Japan .
Philippine Islands, exports

450,000
250,000

436,026
170,000

405,227
332,158

262,000
243,000

Total in Asia

5,250,000

4,828,200

4,569,952

4,268,618

265 ooo

1 95 ,000

159,681

246,408

Fiji Islands, exports .

100,000

100,000

90,000

102,000

Total in Australia and
Polynesia

365,000

295,000

249,681

348,408

1 Estimate reduced to 225,000 tons.

148

APPENDIX

149

I. — (continued) — •

Cane Sugar.

1917-18
Estimate
Tons

1916-7
To:s

1915-16
Tons

1914-15
Tons

Egypt (consumed locally)

100,000

101,832

98,964

75,738

Reunion, exports

Natal

45,ooo

45,ooo

45,ooo

39,267

Mozambique .

50,000

55,ooo

50,000

40,000

Total in Africa .

534,000

525,505

524,973

523,788

Europe — Spain (cane)

6,000

6,000

6,359

7,376

Total Cane Sugar Crops .

12,070,000

11,233,294

io,675,557

10,288,656

Beetroot Sugar

Europe — Beet Sugar Crops
United States— Beet Sugar Crop
Canada — Beet Sugar Crop

3,849,000
875,000
12,500

4,555,407
734,577
12,500

5,o77,76o
779,756
17,641

7,583,215
646,257
13,979

Total Beet Sugar Crops
Grand Total — Cane and Beet

4,736,5oo
16,806,500

5,302,484
16,535,778

5,875,157
16,550,714

8,243,451
18,532,107

Estimated increase in 1917-18
in the world's production .

1 270,722

II. — CROPS OF BEETROOT SUGAR ON THE CONTINENT OF

EUROPE

•
(From Licht's " Monthly Circular.")

1916-17
WAR
W. & G.
Tons

1913-14
Tons

1912-13
Tons

1911-12
Tons

1910-11
Tons

1909-10
Tons

Germany
Austria
France
Russia
Bslgium
Holland
Others

1,350,000
900,000
181,385
1,158,920
133,210
260,000
571,892

2,738,000
1,710,000
800,000
1,750,000
230,000
230,000
796,7oo

2,732,189

1,919,853
978,838

1,383,754
300,253
316,933
709,243

1,505,479
1,154,606
516,618
2,058,635
246,220
267,607
530,ooo

2,606,122
1,538,034
724,897
2,140,000
284,714
221,359
590,000

2,033,834
1,256,751
806,405
1,126,853
249,612
198,456
465,000

4,555,407

8,254,700

8,341,063

6,279,165

8,105,126

6,136,911

II— (1463)

150

SUGAR

III. — PROGRESS IN CANE AND BEET PRODUCTION SINCE
1903, the date of the Convention

(Journal des Fabricants de Sucre, 10 October, 1917.)

Beet

Year

Cane

Europe

United
States
and
Canada

Total
World's
Production

1903- 4. . .

TONS

4,234,000

TONS

5,881,000

TONS

208,000

TONS

10,323,000

1904- 5. . .
1905- 6. . !
1906- 7. . .
1907- 8. . .
1908- 9. . .
1909-10. . .
1910-11. . .
1911-12. . .
1912-13. . .
1913-14. . .

4,594,000
6,731,000
7,329,000
6,922,000
7,633,000
8,327,000
8,390,000
9,067,000
9,232,000
9,821,000

4,708,000
6,932,000
6,710,000
6,562,000
6,543,000
6,137,000
8,095,000
6,279,000
8,341,000
8,179,000

209,000
283,000
433,000
440,000
384,000
450,000
455,000
541,000
635,000
667,000

9,511,000
13,946,000
14,472,000
13,924,000
14,560,000
14,914,000
16,940,000
15,887,000
18,208,000
18,667,000

THE WAR
1914-15. . '.
1915-16. . .
1916-17. . .

10,288,000
10,667,000
11,169,000

7,583,000
5,077,000
4,764,000

660,000
797,000
747,000

18,531,000
16,541,000
16,680,000

1 The jump in the figure for cane sugar production, from
4,594,000 tons in 1904-5 to 6,731,000 tons in 1905-6, is mis-
leading. It is caused by the sudden inclusion, by the statis-
ticians, of a more or less imaginary figure as representing what
was for the first time officially announced to be the estimate
of the native production of sugar in British India. (See p. 89.)

APPENDIX

J51

IV. — PROGRESS OF THE EUROPEAN BEET SUGAR
PRODUCING COUNTRIES during the period of the

Convention, 1903-14
(Journal des Fabricants de Sucre.)

1903-4

1913-14

Difference

TONS

TONS

PER CENT.

Germany

-

1,929,410

2,725,000

+ 41-2

Austria

1,158,800

1,692,000

+ 46

France

794,430

786,000

- 1-06

Russia

1,160,660

1,731,000

+ 49-1

Belgium

202,850

230,300

+ 13-5

Holland

,

123,500

228,600

+ 85-1

Sweden

107,240

136,500

+ 27-2

Denmark

. 45,900

146,000

+ 218

Italy

,

135,000

327,800

+ 142

Spain (bee

t)

70,800

160,000

+ 125

5,728,590

8,163,200

The progress of Germany, Austria, Belgium, Holland,
and Sweden is a natural increase to keep pace with
increased consumption. The increase in Russia is
artificial, because there is still a bounty. Italy and
Spain have protected markets and no surplus. The
rapid growth of the Danish and Dutch industries is very
creditable. There are several reasons for the stationary
condition of France, of which high cost of production
is one.

152

SUGAR

V. — YIELD OF SUGAR FROM THE BEETROOT.

Europe and the United States
(Truman G. Palmer, Washington, U.S.A.)

Roots per Acre
Short Tons

Raw Sugar
Extraction,

Sugar per Acre

2,000 lt>S.

per 100 of Roots

pounds

1908-9 1910-1

I9I3-4

1908-9

1910-1

I9I3-4

1908-9

1910-1

I9I3-4

United States

9-36

10-17

9-76

13-86

14-01

14-40

2,594

2,848

2,810

Germany

1 2 -08

14-70

14-17

17-61

16-44

1 6-08

4,253

4,835

4,5'59

Russia

6-99

8-74

7-6o

15-21

16-12

14-09

2,127

2,819

2,143

Austria

10-71

12-36

11-50

17-44

14-85

I5-38

3,737

3,672

3,500

France.

12-36

10-76

12-52

i3'3i

12-90

12-87

3,288

2,775

3,223

Belgium

13-34

14-53

12-33

14-96

14-30

15-06

3,990

4,156

3,7i6

Holland

12-46

12-96

11-19

15-87

15-04

14-77

3,954

3,898

3,306

Sweden

12-35

14-03

13-76

15-53

15-74

15-49

3,836

4,416

4,262

Denmark

12*97

1531

I3P93

15

14-31

15-13

3,893

4,38i

4,216

Spain .

15-74

10-82

10-81

12-47

1443

12-96

3,926

3,123

2,801

Italy .

15-14

16-63

20-89

11-70

1 1 -94

11-67

3,541

3,972

4,874

Russia and the United States are very much behind
all the others. France is disappointing.

VI. — DEVELOPMENT OF THE UNITED STATES BEET-
SUGAR INDUSTRY SINCE 1900
(Truman G. Palmer.)

TONS OF 2,000 LB.

Raw

Roots

Sugar

Sugar

Tons of

Acres

Sugar

per Acre

per Acre

Extrac-

of Sugar

Years

harvested

tion

per

per loo

Factory

Tons

Tons

Pounds

of Roots

1900- i

132,000

95,646

6-15

1,449

1 1 -78%

2,813

I9OI- 2

1902- 3

175,083
216,400

205,111
242,672

9-63
8-76

2,343
2,243

12-17
12-80

5,697
5,9i8

1903- 4

242,576

267,337

8-56

2,204

12-87

5,455

1904- 5

197,784

269,014

10-47

2,720

12-99

5,604

1905- 6

307,364

347,690

8-67

2,262

13-04

6,686

1906- 7

376,074

537,346

11-26

2,857

12-68

8,529

1907- 8

370,984

515,142

10-16

2,777

13-67

8,176

1908- 9

364,913

473,204

• 9-36

2,594

13-86

7,632

1909-10

420,262

569,410

9-71

2,710

13-95

8,760

1910-11

398,029

566,857

10-17

2,848

14-01

9,292

1911-12

473,877

666,111

10-68

8,8X1

13-16

10,092

1912-13

555,300

769,507

9-41

2,772

I4-73

10,541

Estimate

1913-14 .

580,006

814,890

9-76

2,810

14-40

ir,477

APPENDIX

153

VII. — QUANTITY OF CANE SUGAR PER FACTORY

TURNED OUT IN CUBA IN THE YEAR 1913-14

(Truman G. Palmer.)

Tons

per Factory

Number
of
Factories

Under 1,000 tons per factory .
1,000 to 5,000 tons per factory .
5,000 to 10,000 „ „ ' .
10,000 to 20,000
20,000 to 40,000
40,000 to 60,000 ,, .
60,000 to 80,000
80,000 to 100,000 „ ,,
Over 100,000 „ „

2

22
49
48
39
8
3

Total Number

of Factories

173

Total Production .

Tons

2,971,976

Average Production per Factory

Tons

17,179

VIII. — MELTINGS OF SUGAR IN CLYDE REFINERIES

From WILLIAM CONNAL & Co.'s Monthly Circular,
Glasgow, 31st December, 1917

Year

West
India

Tons

Mauri-
tius

Tons

Brazil
Tons

Cuba
and
Porto
Rico

Tons

Beet-
root

Tons

Java
Tons

Other
Foreign

Tons

Total
Tons

1913 .

• 3,376

415

—

82,804

120,713

3,299

20,596

231,333

1914 .

• 5,570

—

890

64,283

68,945

25,841

35,092

200,621

1915 .

. —

18,598

2,433

86,839

—

102,699

19,120

229,6Sg

1916 .

. 4,800

9,460

—

138,302

—

50,835

18,115

221,512

1917 .

• 8,474

—

3,040

157,238

—

60,979

7,454

237,185

154

SUGAR

IX. — HAWAIIAN ISLANDS SUGAR PRODUCTION IN 1916
(Truman G. Palmer.)

Plantation companies in operation
Acres harvested . . .

Canes per acre, tons (2,000 Ib.) .
Sugar produced ,,(,,).
per acre ,,(,,).
,, extraction per 100 of cane

(Highest, tons
Lowest ,,
Average

52

115,489
42

593,483

5-13

12.2

59,035

144

11,413

X. — COST OF PRODUCTION OF 100 POUNDS OF RAW
SUGAR IN THE BEET

(Truman G. Palmer, Washington.)

DOLLARS PER 100 LB.

Five-years' Average

United
States

Germany

Russia

Austria

France

Holland

1908-9 to 1912-13

2-30

1-50

i'53

1-49

1-78

1-46

APPENDIX

155

XI.— CONSUMPTION OF SUGAR IN THE UNITED STATES

(OFFICIAL)

1917

1916

1915

Preferential and Non- Dutiable — •
Louisiana, Texas (Cane)
United States (Beet) .
Hawaii (Cane) .
Porto Rico (Cane)
Philippine Islands (Cane)
Various Sugars .

TONS
(2,240 ».)
263,894
839,577
631,478
463,658
79,086
II,846

TONS

224,978
7OO,256
533,969
392,733
III,l82
14,000

TONS

224,768
769,257
509,263
300,310
120,202
15,400

Total Domestic
Cuba (Cane), on which Tariff concession allowed

2,289,539
I,65I,76l

1,977,118
1,666,548

1,939,200
1,841,602

Total Preferential and Non-Dutiable Sugars .
Fore:gi, on which full Duty assessed

3,941,300
12,887

3,643,666
14,941

3,780,802
20,729

Total Consumption

3,954,187 3,658,607

3,801,531

Practically the whole was supplied by the States,
Territories, and Protectorates of the Republic.

XII. — OUR HOME CONSUMPTION

For the last complete year before the war, and the first complete
year during the war.

1913

1915

Refined (Imported) ....
Refined (in Bond) in the United-Kingdom
Raw

Total
Less Exports of British Refined .

Total consumption of Sugar

Molasses ......
Molasses manufactured in U.K. .

Total consumption of Molasses.

TONS

899,327
715,661
116,942

TONS

572,618
784,316
293,276

1,731,930
23,271

1,650,210
4,972

1,708,659

1,645,238

158,162
85,584

145,703
70,125

243,746

215,828

156

SUGAR

XIII. — THE IMPORTS OF SUGAR INTO THE UNITED
KINGDOM FOR THE LAST COMPLETE YEAR

BEFORE THE WAR AND THE FlRST COMPLETE

YEAR DURING THE WAR — a very interesting
comparison.

Unrefined Sugars

1913

TONS

1915

TONS

Germany ......
Netherlands ......
Belgium ......
France .......

471,689
",377
2,526
18

Austria-Hungary .
Java

161,038

Philippines 5,943

Cuba ....
Dutch Guiana
Hayti and San Domingo

223,980
4,501
9,409

353,906
1,544
280

Peru
Brazil

27,520

3i,88i

Mauritius ......
British India
British West Indies, British Guiana, and
British Honduras ....
Other Countries .....

20,178
3,850

47,7"
53,312

i",875
866

115,646
38,267

Total Raw Sugars ....

1,046,482

975,653

Refined Sugars
Russia ....
Germany ....
Holland .
Belgium ....
France ....
Austria-Hungary ....
Other Countries ....

2,940
466,749
178,789
49,920
26,576
198,431
i,395

2,191
93,"7

44
Java . . 105,149
United States 184,894
Argentina . 29,142
Mauritius . 85,118
Other Countries 6,828

Total Refined Sugars .

924,800

506,483

Molasses ......

164,908

146,255

Total Imports ....

2,136,190

1,628,391

APPENDIX

157

XIV. — EUROPEAN per capita SUGAR CONSUMPTION
(Willett & Gray, New York.}

Consumption

Country

Population

per head

1Q14 1 5

1 £/ 1 *T-~ 1 O

1914-5

1913-4

1912-3

/6s.

Ibs.

Ibs.

Denmark ....

2,770,000

93-48

95-57

98-16

United Kingdom

46,600,000

89-69

93-37

95-52

Germany ....

68,000,000

74-95

45-13

49-26

Switzerland

3,850,000

74-87

73-55

77-24

Sweden .

5,645,000

60-48

57-73

57-09

Norway ....

2,430,000

60-37

46-64

45-83

Holland .

6,230,000

53-44

50-09

40-90

Belgium . . . .

7,500,000

42-79

36-08

39-20

France ....

39,610,000

39-01

43-85

43-47

Austria-Hungary

52,300,000

37-38

29-17

28-14

Finland ....

3,155,000

32-54

32-65

32-54

Russia ....

136,210,000

29-26

25-43

24-31

Turkey ....

21,650,000

20-33

21-93

19-84

Rumania .

7,605,000

17-12

9-26

8-89

Spain .

19,750,000

15-91

14-19

15-62

Portugal ....

5,990,000

13-60

14-70

13-57

Italy .

34,750,000

10-45

11-68

11-05

Bulgaria ....

4,950,000

9-94

9-61

7-83

Greece . .

4,270,000

8-99

7-68

11-57

Serbia

4,500,000

4-60

10-03

9-33

Europe average.

477,735,000

41-73

36-83

36-61

United States (W. and G.) .

101,577,000

83-83 | 84-29

85-40

158 SUGAR

XV. — THE PRICE OF SUGAR DURING THE CONVENTION
PERIOD, 1903-1914

The average cost of production of European raw
beetroot sugar, basis 88 per cent., f.o.b. Hamburg, is
between 9s. and 10s. per cwt.

The price from September, 1903, to July, 1904, was
below cost of production. A failure of the crop in 1904
caused a deficiency of 1,200,000 tons in the supply of
sugar, and prices consequently rose. The 1905 crop
was a heavy one, and prices fell from 16s. in January,
1905, to 11s. in July and 8s. 9d. in August — once more
below the cost of production. In 1906 prices were
below 9s., and for many months far below cost of pro-
duction. During 1907 prices ranged between 8s. and
10s. In 1908 they ranged between 9s. 6d. and 11s. 3d.
The crop of 1909 was a poor one, and prices rose till
August, 1910, when they began to fall down to 8s. 9d.
in October, remaining below 10s. till March, 1911,
when fears of another bad crop, which eventually
showed a deficiency of 1,800,000 tons, caused an
inevitable and very serious rise. In 1912, prices fell
to 9s. and in 1913 below 9s., and ranged between 9s.
and 10s. until the war came.

This is a reply to those who try to make people
believe, and to those who so readily do believe, that
prices have been high owing to the abolition -of the
bounties. They can now see that during the period
1903-14 prices were generally below or round about
the cost of production. They can also see that, con-
sumers, having been compelled by the action of the
bounties to be dependent on the bounty-fed area of
Europe for their supplies, have to endure high
prices whenever there is a deficient beetroot crop.
The high prices are, therefore, caused by the bounties,
not by their abolition.

S3Nmms

oe t- co ir->

•

-xi sosmiHS

From T/ze International Sugar Journal of September, 1908.

BEET SUGAR PRODUCED IN THE AREAS LYING N(

40 60 SO 100 120 140

I OF LAT. 40° N.f AND ALSO NEAR SAN FRANCISCO

INDEX

AMERICAN prices, 24

- Refining Co., 118

- Sugar, South, 24
Antiguan Sugar, 94
Archard, Francis Karl, 104
Argentine Sugar, 24, 98
Aspinall pan, The, 65
Australian Sugar, 25, 101
Avebury, Lord, 127

BARBADOS, 94
Beet, 17

— Analysis, 48

— Sowing of, 22 ; in
Germany, 21, 24 ; Rus-
sia, 24 ; pits, 22 ; pulp,
47

Beet-sugar, discovery of, 1 04;
history of industry in
France and Germany, 104;
in Austria, 109 ; in
Russia, 110; Exports from
Austria, France and Ger-
many, 108 ; Cost of pro-
duction in Germany and
Russia, 110; European
statistics, 112; in U.S.A.,
115; fall of prices, 138;
future of, 139

Berbice, 66

Boivin, 82

Bounties abolished, 131

Brazilian Sugar, 96

" Brewers' Sugar," 35

Bristol, 8

British Guiana Sugar, 25,
94

British Refining and Colonial
Sugar Production, Select
Committee on, 118
— West Indian Sugar, 4,
94

Brown Sugar, 4 [127-9

Brussels Convention, The,

CANADA, 115

Cane crops, dates of, 25 ;

statistics of, 89
Cane-crushing, 26-37
" Carbo-hydrates," 35
Cartel, The German, 128 ;

the Austrian, 130
Cartels abolished, 130
Centrifugal machine, The, 71
Chinese Sugar, 17
Clarification, 56-62
" Climax," 78
Colloids, 40

" Compensator," The, 32
Convention, The, 130-4, 143
" Copper Wall," The, 51
Congress of the Chamber of

Commerce of the Empire,

The, 127
Crushed Sugar :— White, 4;

yellow, 4 [74

" Crystallization in Motion,"
Crystalloids, 40
Crystals, White, 72
Cuban Sugar, 17, 24, 25, 69,

92, 98
Cube Sugar, 86

DEMERARA Sugar, 48, 54, 69,
75

159

160

INDEX

Dextrose, 34

Diffusion Process, The, 39-

47; 49
Dominion Sugar Company,

116

Dubrunfaut, 77
Duncan, Mr. James, 10, 82

EGYPTIAN Sugar, 25

Elsdorf, 88

Export Figures, 125

FIJI, 25

" First Products," 72, 75
Formosan Sugar, 14, 17, 25
Fructose, 78

Fryer, Alfred, 64; his
Concretor, 64

GEERLIGS, Dr. Prinsen, 36, 75,

99

Glasgow refineries, 6
Glucose, 36, 76, 78
Golden Syrup. See Syrup
Granulated Crystals, 72
Greenock, 6; Sugar Exchange,

The, 138

Green Syrup. See Syrup
"Gur," 50

HAITI Sugar, 94
Havana ,, 4
Hawaian „ 91, 98
Horsin-Deon, 48
Hughes, 78

IMPORTATION Figures, 2
Indian Sugar, 25, 98, 137

JAMAICA Sugar, 4, 48, 75, 94
Japan, 18

Java Sugar, 20, 25, 48,
61, 69, 72, 91, 94, 98, 142
Jelinek, 58

LANGEN, Eugen, 62, 88
Levulose, 34

Lippmann, Prof., Dr.E.O.,142

Liverpool, 8

Loiseau, 59, 82

London Beetroot Sugar

Association, The, 140
Louisiana Sugar, 17, 25, 90,

98, 109
Lubbock, Sir Nevile, 127

MAPLE Sugar, 137

Margraaf, 104

Mauritius Sugar, 4, 25, 101-3

Megass, 27-30 ; 47

Mexican Sugar, 25, 96

Minchin, Mr. 46

Mincing Lane Sugar Market,

137-40 ; how changed since

1860, 141
'' Molascuit," 78
Molasses, 47, 48, 75, 77, 78
" Molassine Meal," 78
Muscovado Sugar, 4, 20, 54

NEW SOUTH WALES, 101

" PALMYRA Jaggery," 137
Perier, 58

Peruvian Sugar, 69, 96
Philippines „ The, 17, 25,

Plant-cane crop, The, 18
Polariscope, The, 31
Porto Rican Sugar, 17, 91
Possoz, 58

QUEENSLAND Sugar, 101

RATOON Crops, The, 20

Reunion, 95

Refineries : — East End, 4 ;
at Greenock, 6 ; Leith, 6
See also Sugar Refining

" Reducing Sugars," 34, 35

Rillieux the Inventor, 67

Robert, Julius, 39

Rum, 75

INDEX

161

SACHS, M. Francis, 144

S. Domingo Sugar, 69, 95

S. Lucia Sugar, 94

Sandwich Islands Sugar, 17,
21, 92

Seedling Canes, 21

" Sereh " disease, The, 99

Spanish Sugar, 99

Steffen, the Inventor, 47

Sucrose, 35, 36, 77, 78

Sugar : — Consumption of, 3 ;
Crystallizable, 31-4 ;

Houses, 3 ; " invert," 34,
37, 48, 86 ; percentages,
cane and beet, 76 ; Un-
crystallizable, 31, 34

- cane : — Analysed, 36 ;
crops, 24 ; fibres, flower,
growth, juice, leaves, 16 ;
planted, 14 ; ripening, 16

- Duties, International
Conference on, 117; in
Brussels, 120, 142 ; Paris,
120; London, 120

- Factories, Chemical
control of, 78

Sugar, Refining, 3; in Bristol,
8, 12 ; Lanes, 12 ; Liver-
pool, 7 ; London, 10 ;
Manchester, 9 ; Scotland,
6, 7, 12 ; Chapter on, 80-88

Surtax, Limitation of, 128

Sutherland, Sir Thomas, 127

Syrup, 76

Golden, 8, 35, 86

- Green, 87

TATE, Sir Henry, 10, 82
Texas, 24
Treacle, 4

Trinidad, 66, 93, 98
Tnple-effet, The, 67-9

VACUUM Pan, The, 51, 66, 70

WEST Indian Sugar, 3, 20, 25,

51, 69

West Indies, French, 95
Wetzel Pan, The, 65
Wiley, Dr., 115

" YELLOW Crystals," 55

THE END

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