“For my own part, I have always reckoned as an average, 3,600 lbs. of dry sugar to the acre as the return this cane will give, on anything like good land, in the Straits, according to the present imperfect mode of expressing and manufacture; but, considering the surpassing richness of land in the West India Islands, Demerara, and Mauritius, I should not be in any way surprised to find that it would there give even three tons an acre.

The Salangore cane grows firm and strong; stands upright much better than the Otaheite; gives juice most abundantly, which is sweet and easy of clarification, boils well, and produces a very fine, fair sugar, of a bold and sparkling grain.”

Much discussion has arisen on the subject of raising the sugar cane from seed, and the possibility has been universally denied among the planters and agricultural societies of the West India colonies.  Mr. Pritchard, a sugar planter of Louisiana, in the “United States Patent Report for 1850,” however, states:—­

“It is an error to suppose that the cane cannot be propagated from the seed.  This may be the case when the seed is obtained from plants that have been produced for a number of years from buds, or eyes.  All plants that have been produced in this way for a series of years, lose the faculty of forming prolific seeds; and the sugar cane is governed by the same laws which govern the whole vegetable kingdom.  It cannot, therefore, be expected to produce seeds after it has been cultivated for a great length of time.”

The sugar cane is composed of water, woody fibre, and soluble matter, or sugar.  In round numbers it may be stated that the proportions are 72 per cent. of water, 10 per cent. of woody fibre, and 18 per cent. of sugar.

The fluid contents of a cane, according to Dr. Evans, contain 90 per cent. of the entire structure of the stem.

1,000 grains of sugar cane, being burnt, gave 71/2 grains of ash, which, on analysis, furnished the following components:—­

  Silica 1.78
  Phosphate of lime 3.41
  Red oxide of iron and clay .17
  Carbonate of potash 1.46
  Sulphate of potash .15
  Carbonate of magnesia .43
  Sulphate of lime 6
                                ——­
                                7.46

The following is the quantative analysis of a portion of soil taken from the surface of a cane field, on the Diamond estate, in St. Vincent, West Indies:  —­

  Alumina soluble in acids 12.87
  Organic matter 11.26
  Gypsum .23
  Carbonate of lime 12.52
  ——­ of magnesia .71
  Oxide of iron 8.51
  Oxide of manganese .33
  Insoluble silicious and aluminous matter 53.57
                                             ------
                                             100.00