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38 THE SOUTHERN WORLD, DECEMBER 1, 1883. S£ht %gfoi[h Ml**#- Silk Culture. SECOND PAPER. I am confident, many are giving this sub ject due consideration, and if our people wilt only have the faith to adopt, and the resolu tion to persevere, silk culture will prove the greatest blessing this country ever knew. It offers an easy and remunerative employment to hundreds of feeble hands unfit for man ual labor, and to toiling daughters, depressed widows and helpless orphans, having but little strength or courage, to contend with the buffets and snares, ever encountered on the grand boulevards of struggling human ity,—an honest living, in the peaceful quietude of their own home. The rearing of silk worms, and the man agement of a cocoonry, is light, simple work and any one, with patience, perseverance and care will become a successful producer. There is nothing disagreeable, disgusting or degrading connected with the business, and the most high toned may join the onward march, giving dignity to a national pursuit. Experience and training schools are not nec essary to insure the success of any beginner. I never saw a Bilk worm egg until I bought them, neither a silk worm or a cocoon, until I raised them. Yet I have been very success ful. Silk that I raised last year, was reeled and woven, in the handsome brocade, pre sented to Mrs. Garfield by the Ladies Silk Association, Philadelphia. As this refer ence is necessary to prove my assertions, I trust I will not be considered egotistical. The theories, precepts, and examples found in a multiplicity of works on silk culture, do very well to read, but when tested, you will find they are but little help to the silk producers of our genial sunny South. De pend on tel/, rely on your own judgment, and success will crown your efforts. COCOONRY. With a majority of the uninitiated, a co coonry seems to signify a labyrinth of mys tical belongings; these fnlse ideas can be easily corrected. My cocoonry consists of an unpretentious out building 22x16 feet hav ing a brick chimney with open fire place, one door on the east side, one window in each sideandend, with sash and solid blinds. This house is not ceiled, and the flooring has shrunk, leaving good ventilators. In this house I placed an old-fashioned dining table of fifty years ago, and covered with old news papers; on these were placed two more benches seven feet long, which were also covered with old news papers, and with this arrangement I raised my first crop of co coons. Since increasing my stock, I use frames or stands of shelves 3x6 feet. The first shelf is two feet from the floor, the oth ers are fourteen inches apart and continues up to within two feet of the joist. These stands must not touch the wall, and there must be sufficient space between them for the feeders to pass with ease. Shelves are best made of old or seasoned lumber, as silk worms seem to have an instinctive antip athy for new wood. Pure air and thorough ventilation are absolute essentials to insure the health and vigor of yoursilk worms. In this latitude we need no fire in cocoonry, except when the weather is damp and chilly. All who wish to engage in silk culture, can, by putting their wits to work, make suitable arrangements to accommodate sev eral thousand silk worms, thus incurring no expense except the amount paid for eggs. After you have made a beginning, you can raise your own eggs and increase your stock according to the capacity of your cocoonry. Some correspondents attribute my success in rearing silk worms to "a secret, I do not wish to tell," thit it not to. What I have learned, or may learn from observation, ex periments or experience I will freely give to off. If silk culture is to be a national indus try, by which a struggling people hope to obtain, remuneration for their labor, there must be unity and cooperation among pro ducers. . The many impediments which fettered this noble enterprise in the years that are gone, do not exist to-day and there is no just cause why tilt will not become one of the most profitable products of our land. I will answer all inquiries with pleasure,—en close stamp for reply. _ .. _ Mrs. J. B. Mitchell, Jlawkxntvxlle, Go. any other of the cereals. Animals who live on grain composed largely of starch are not well nourished; do not thrive well and long on starch alone, but do live and flourish where gluten is contained in considerable quantities. They do better still when they can get for food a mixture of all the constit- ents of the grains. These constituents exist in all, but not in the same proportions. Maize contains more oil; wheat more gin ten. Some grains contain comparatively little oil or gluten. Oatmeal is obtained by kiln-drying the oats and removing the out er skin. Its flour is coarser than wheat flour. Its taste is peculiar and not always liked. The Scotch oatmeal is coarser than the English, and is more highly valued. Barley is very little used in making bread. Pearl barley is the grain deprived of its husk, rounded and polished by attrition. Patent barley is pearl barley ground to the state of floui. Bariev contains but very little gluten in a free state Its plastic matter is albumen and casein. It cannot be made into vesicu- lated bread, but a bread is formed of it by mixing wheat flour with barley meal. It is less digestible, less palatable and less nutri tious than wheaten bread. Barley water, so useful as a nutritive and demulcent drink ip sickness, is prepared from pearl barley. Barley, under the influence of warmth and moisture, germinates and the growth of the sprouts being checked by exposing the grain to heat in a kiln, is called malt. It contains diastase,and converts the starch into dextrine and sugar. The malt, infused in hot watei, yields sweet wort, rich in sugar, that is used for making beer. Rye, in form somewhat resembles wheat. The centre is starchy, and the grain contains some gluten, and so may be made into vesiculated bread. It is the staple food of some sections of the earth, in which wheat will not grow. It has nearly the nutritious value of wheat. Its brown color and acid taste render it of much less value. Its relaxing effect upon the food canal renders it useful in constipation. Maize exists in many varieties. Pop-corn has the peculiar quality, on exposing to strong heat, of turning inside out All the varieties, deprived of itshull and broken or coarsely ground are known as hom- inys-amp, or grits, which is boiled and eaten like rice. It contains but little gluten and so is not fitted for bread, unless with wheat or rye. The brown bread of the Eastern 8tates is a mixture of wheat, maize and rye meal. Maize meal is made into a porridge or mush. Maize has a peculiar flavor, much disliked by children. It contains a large amount of fat forming matter, so that on keeping for some time and exposed to the warm air, it acquires a rancid taste. It contains a large percentage of starch, and a small one of plastic, fatty and mineral mat ter, and so is not a nutritious article of diet. To obtain a sufficient amount of nutriment a very large quantity must be eaten. Starch, eaten with plastic articles, as milk, meat and cheese, promotes growth and strength. It is easily digested, and is a proper aliment in disorders of the intestines, especially in diarrhoea and dysentery. Rice flour of the shops is usually so much adulterated that for the sick, or for the well, rice, if needed in the form of flour, should be ground at home. Boiling rice is so apt to remove what little plastic matter it contains that steam ing is the best way of cooking it.—American Elevator and Grain Trade. Sorghum Sugar. The National Academy of Sciences in re- Fuels About Grain. Wheat is the prince of grains. It contains not only starch and other constituents com mon to all grains, bat a large per cent, of | gluten—the plastic principle of grain. 80 it yields a larger amount of nourishment than sponse to a request from Dr. G. B. Loring, the United 8tates Commissioner of Agricul ture, investigated the "scientific and eco nomic relations of the sorghum sugar indus try” through a committee consisting of Pro fessors Brewer, Johnson and Silliman, of Yale College, ProfessorsChandlerand Moore, of New York, and Professor Smith, late of the University of Kentucky. Prof. Goess- man, of Amherst, Mass., resigned his place on the committee on September 12, 1882. The committee find as the result of their in vestigation that all the analyses made in the Department of Agriculture not only confirm the well-known fact of the presence of sugar in the juices of sorghum and maize in nota ble quantity, but they also establish the fact that sorghum yields in its juice, when taken at the proper stage of development, about as much sugar as the best sugar cane of tro pical regions. An examination of the ana lytical tables submitted to them shows that the juices of sorghum in certain exceptional but not isolated cases were remarkable for the amount of cane sugar they contained. It is ascertained by these analysis that as an average of them all there was 68.57 per cent of the weight of stripped stalks in juice. Of the weight of this juice 16.18 per cent, was crystalizable cane sugar, and it was learned that 11.30 per cent of the weight of the juice may be obtained os sugar by the ordi nary process of manufacture. • It also appears that three varieties of sor ghum gave over 13 per cent, of sugar, seven varieties 12 per cent., seven 11 per cent., seven 10 per cent., and seven 0 per cent, of sugar; and that of the varieties of maize grown in 1880, ten varieties gave over 9 per cent cane sugar, ten varieties 10 per cent., nine varieties 11 per cent., nine varieties li percent, four varieties 13 per cent., one var" ety 14 per cent., and one 15 per cent. The committee state that in 1880 over 62,000,000 acres of land, or 30 per cent, of all the culti vated land of the United States were maize. Theamountof sugar thus apparently lost, calculated by the results obtained by the Department of Agriculture in the last three years is equal to the present productof the entire world. A remarkable uniformity has been discovered in the several varieties of sorghum as sugar producing plants when fully developed, but it has also been learned that the different varieties vary widely in the time required for their full development, varying, as has been shown, fully three months between the earlier and later matur ing varieties. No conclusion," says the report, “ estab lished by the work of the Department of Ag riculture, practically considered, is of greater importance than the positive ascertainment of that period in the development of the several varieties of sorghum when the juices contain the maximum of cane sugar. On this point there has existed during the past twenty years or more the greatest discrep ancy in statement, and the general opinion prevailing nas been very wide of the truth as established by all these experiments." The in vestigations of the Department prove to the entire satisfaction of the committee that after the cutting of the came it "should be immediately worked up" for the produc tion of sugar. The results submitted to the committee also indicate that the exclusion from the matured cane of all immature cane is of the greatest importance if the manufac ture of sugar is contemplated, and show the importance of an even crop with no suckers in its manufacture for sugar. The committee also find that “prompt working of the cane so soon as cut is always safe, and any delay is fraught with unavoidable risk of loss. This conclusion is established as well by the work of Dr. Goessman as by that of the Depart ment of Agriculture. The statements sub mitted by the Department also show that sugar has been made from sorghum and corn stalks. " It will be seen from the reports of the past three years of the Department of Agriculture, as well as from a wide range of experience elsewhere, that sugar in large quantities has been shown to be present in the juices of sorghum, and maize also, which is of the first importance from the economi cal side. High grade marketable sugar in considerable quantity has been successfully made from sorghum juice, comparing favor ably with sugar from the true sugar cane or sugar beet." The committee have also found that the hydrometer and ripe seed are sufficient to in dicate the proper time for working up the crop. It is shown, moreover, by the inves tigation at the Department, that the idea that the effect of rain would be manifest in the diluted juice and that conversely a pro longed drouth would result in a concentra tion and diminution of the juice is utterly unfounded and Incorrect. It has been shown that when fully matured the sorghum stands even hard frosts without detriment, but if immature the effect is most disastrous. With regard to the manufacture of sugar from sorghum, the experiments of the De partment have shown that the statement of Dr. Goessman that "in sight of these facts will be quite generally conceded that the sugar production from syrup like the above must remain a mere incidental feature in the amber cane industry in our section of the country" is entirely unfounded and that the relative loss of sucrose in the syrup was only 5 per cent, of that present in the juice, in stead of being, as Dr. Goessman found, 30.85 per cent; and was no more than usual with sugar cane juice—a fact of the utmost im portance to the farmer as well as the manu facturer. With regard to the so-called gum, a product of the manufacture, the com mittee say that in the purging of sorghum and corn-stalk sugar it happens very often that this operation is of unusual difficulty owing to the presence of a certain gummy substance, and this practical difficulty has been by some so magnified that the economi cal production of sugar from these two plants has been confidently declared impos sible. In the experience of those in Wash ington as well as that of many other ob servers, this peculiar substance has been found often to be present in quantity so small as to offer little if any resistance to complete purging in the ordinary centrifu gal. It appears to be formed by transforms* tion of other constituents of the juice in the process of syrup production. The committee recommend a still further investigation into the effect of fertilizers upon the growth of the sorghum and maize, variety of soil best adapted to the produc tion of sugar in these plants, the methods of defecation, and the process of manufac ture and use of lime or some other alkaline agent. The committee express the opinion that the fruits of the encouraging “policy of the government toward the sorghum indus try are already beginning to show themselves in the decided success which has attended the production of sugar from sorghum on a commercial scale in the few cases in which the rules and good practice evolved, espe cially by the researches made at the labora tory of the Department of Agriculture, have been intelligently followed. Sufficiently full returns from the crop of 1882 have al ready come to hand to convince us that the industry will probably be a commercial suc cess.” The report concludes with the sug gestion that the "sugar producing industries of the whole country, both that of the tropi cal cane of the South and the sorghum over a far wider area, will be vastly benefitted by further investigation similar to those that have already been submitted to them.” The conclusion arrived at by the Depart ment in the laboratoryand mill asitsspecial contribution to the sorghum industry, and the conclusions obtained elsewhere, are in the opinion of the committee as follows: First—Cane should be worked up as soon as cut. Second—That suckers should not be allow ed in the crop. Third—That the exclusion of all immature cane is of the greatest importance in the manufacture of sugar. Fourth—Sugar has been made from sor ghum corn stalks. Fifth—Ripe seed will indicate the proper time for working up the crop. Sixth—Rain and drouth do not affect the quality of the juice. Seventh—Mature sorghum is not injured^ by frost. Eighth—Loss of sucrose in sorghum syrup is no greater than that in syrup from sugar cane. Ninth—That the presence of gum in the syrup of cane and maize is the great obstacle in the way of sugar manufacture. These are the discoveries claimed by the Department. New Method tor Preserving Grain. A new method of preserving grain, re cently discovered in France, it is said, has proven satisfactory. The cost of preserva tion is less than storage in a granary, and the wheat is safe from fire, fermentation, insects and cryptogamic vegetations. The United Statet Miller, in describing this method, says that a sheet-iron cistern, which occupies lit tle space and holds nearly 300 bushels, and is worked by an air-pump with a pressure gauge to indicate the degree of vacuum, com prise the whole hermetic preservation. Oue important effect which results from the nu merous and continuous experiments made according to the journal in question, that the vacuum not only kills the parasitic in sects and prevents vegetation, but dries the grain at the same time. After a detention of seven months, wheat and flour inclosed in the apparatus, during the experiments at Vincennes, it is reported, were withdrawn a perfect state of preservation. A Good Idea* Every family should be compelled by the law of the country to consume by fire every thing that has served its purpose and become useless. Nothing can be more detrimental life and health than old useless stuff lay ing around the dwellings of either city or country homes, producing all kinds of un healthy conditions. For economy’s sake they should be burned and the ashes strewn upon the earth. There is more fertilizing power in one spoonful of ashes than in a basket or even a cart-load of garbage. Was this a law and strictly enforced for one year we should soon see that we not only had fewer large fires but less fevers and other malarial diseases. Cleanliness is next to godliness. Who will be wise enough to try it for one year l—Nat. Farmer, Wathington, D. C. Send for the Soutberh World,