pulp.  This pulp is put into a strong canvas bag and placed under a powerful press to squeeze out the juice.  It is then put into coppers and boiled, undergoing certain other processes.  Most of the operations are nearly the same as those by which the juice of the sugar cane is prepared for use; but much greater skill and nicety are required in rendering the juice of the beet root crystallizable, on account of its greater rawness and the smaller quantity of sugar it contains.  But when this sugar is refined, it is impossible for the most experienced judge to distinguish it from the other, either by the taste or appearance; and from this arose the facility with which smuggled colonial sugar was sold in France, under the name of sugar from beet root.  Five tons of clean roots produce about 41/2 cwt. of coarse sugar, which give about 160 lbs. of double refined sugar, and 60 lbs. of inferior lump sugar.  The rest is molasses, from which a good spirit is distilled.  The dry residue of the roots, after expressing the juice, consists chiefly of fibre and mucilage, and amounts to about one-fourth of the weight of the clean roots used.  It contains all the nutritive part of the root, with the exception of 41/2 per cent. of sugar, which has been extracted from the juice, the rest being water.

As the expense of this manufacture greatly exceeded the value of the sugar produced, according to the price of colonial sugar, it was only by the artificial encouragement of a monopoly and premiums that it could be carried on to advantage.  The process is one of mere curiosity as long as sugar from the sugar cane can be obtained cheaper, and the import duties laid upon it are not so excessive as to amount to a prohibition; and in this case it is almost impossible to prevent its clandestine introduction.

Another mode of making sugar from beet root, practised in some parts of Germany, is as follows, and is said to make better sugar than the other process:—­The roots having been washed, are sliced lengthways, strung on packthread, and hung up to dry.  The object of this is to let the watery juice evaporate, and the sweet juice, being concentrated, is taken up by macerating the dry slices in water.  It is managed so that all the juice shall be extracted by a very small quantity of water, which saves much of the trouble of evaporation.  Professor Lampadius obtained from 110 lbs. of roots 4 lbs. of well-grained white powder-sugar, and the residuum afforded 7 pints of spirit.  Achard says that about a ton of roots produced 100 lbs. of raw sugar, which gave 55 lbs. of refined sugar, and 15 lbs. of treacle.  This result is not very different from that of Chaptal. 6,000 tons of beet root it is said will produce 400 tons of sugar and 100 tons of molasses.