Among the various manufactories, the most prominent was that established at Passy, near Paris, by Mr. Benjamin Delassert, a citizen, the name of whom is always connected with the good and useful.

By means of a series of extensive operations, he got rid of all that was doubtful in the practice, and made no mystery of his plan of procedure, even to those who were his rivals.  He was visited by the head of the government, and was ordered to furnish all that was needed at the Tuilleries.

New circumstances, the restoration of peace, having again reduced colonial sugar to a lower price, the French manufacturers lost the advantages they had gained.  Many, however, yet prosper, and Delassert makes some thousands every year.  This also enables him to preserve his processes until the time comes when they may again he useful. [Footnote:  We may add, that at the session for the general encouragement of national industry, a medal was ordered to be presented to M. Crespel, a manufacturer of arrus, who manufactures every year one hundred and fifty thousand pounds of beet sugar, which he sells at a profit, even—­when Colonial sugar is 2 francs 50 centimes the kilogramme.  The reason is, that the refuse is used for distillation, and subsequently fed out to cattle.]

When beet sugar was in the market, party men, up-starts and fools, took it into their heads that its flavor was unpleasant, and some even said it was unhealthy.

Many experiments have proved the contrary, and the Count de Chaptal, in his excellent book, Chemistry Applied to Agriculture,” (vol. ii. page 13,) says: 

“Sugars obtained from various plants, says a celebrated chemist, are in fact of the same nature, and have no intrinsic difference when they are equally pure.  Taste, crystalization, color, weight, are absolutely identical, and the most acute observer cannot distinguish the one from the other.”

An idea of the force of prejudice is afforded by the fact, that out of one hundred British subjects, taken at random, not ten believe in the possibility of obtaining sugar from the beet.

Uses of sugar.

Sugar was introduced by the apothecaries.  With them it was a most important article, for when a person was greatly in want of any article, there was a proverb, “Like an apothecary without sugar.”

To say that it came thence, is to say that it was received with disfavor; some said that it was heating, others that it injured the chest; some that it disposed persons to apoplexy.  Calumny, however, had to give way to truth, and for eighty years this apothegm has been current, “Sugar hurts nothing but the purse.”

Under this impenetrable aegis the use of sugar has increased every day, and no alimentary substance has undergone so many transformations.  Many persons like sugar in a pure state, and in hopeless cases the faculty recommend it as a substance which can do no possible harm, and which is not unpleasant.