Page 3 Advertisements Column 2

Southland Times, Issue 741, 25 October 1867, Page 3

SUGAR FROM STARCH.

"Aa ; interesting fact lias been com? mumcated to us," says the Journal des Fahricants de Sucre, "by one of our correspondents in Canada, who, contrary to the results obtained in the United Stages, has effected at Montreal the complete conversion of the starch of maize and of cellulose into sugar. Little dextrine and strong crystals were obtained.; . There was a large quantity of this maize sugar manufactured at Mr Molsen's refinery in New York, last year, and : crystallized with cane sugar, and delivered to the trade without any complaint, or the slightest suspicion that it partly consisted of sugars manufactured from cereals. A patent has been taken out in Canada, and another in the United States, and the inventor is actively engaged in following up this curioua discovery, which, if successful, will add another to the different sources of sugar production." On this the Produce Markets Review observes, "It may be visionary on our part, but we cannot help thinking that the manufacture of crystallizable sugar from starch is one of the great chemical discoveries which: will some day or other revolutionise "commerce. We should then be dependent neither on the beet nor on the cane, but every country would be in a position to manufacture sugar from almost all vegetable products. The trade in potatoe or starch or glucose sugar is already a large one in G-ermany^ and if the sugar could be crystallized its developement would be vast."

ELTfCTBiciTY of thb Pbaibib, —" I ; experienced," says Bayard Taylor in" his ' Cplorado,' "three distinct electric shocks, probably from the fact that I was insulated by the india-rubber clothe upon -which I lay, and then touched the earth! with my hand. On the snowy ranges, persons are sometimes so charged that there are sparks and crackling sounds at every movement of their bodies. Men unacquainted with the phenomenon imagine that bees have gotten into their hair, and that rattlesnakes are at their heels. Many strange stories are told of the effect of the fluid, which eeeme to manifest itself irk aa ocoeatrio form,