States, Java, and Mauritius. The heap before us was of a big yellow cane that originally came from Java, and was producing more than two tons and a half per acre-a remarkably good average when we remember that in the early days of sugar-growing here the planters considered they were doing well with an average of a ton and a half. A variety called the Rose Bamboo was also yielding a very satisfactory density. On the previous night the men, according to their custom, ran a fire through the cane ready for cutting, to clear it of dry leaves and other rubbish, and although the heavens had reflected the widespreading conflagration, the cane, now unloaded on the great heap, was practically none the worse for the ordeal, although it naturally had lost its exterior colour and bloom.

The heap of cane, denuded of leaves, was formed at one end of the open mill, and close to the machine, aptly called the cane carrier, incessantly supplied by the "boys" who deposited their burden into the sloping trough, along which it was carried by an endless revolving band up to a couple of Kanakas who fed the rollers. These powerful crushers drew the cane into their grip, expressing every particle of juice and throwing out, as they worked, the refuse, technically known as megass, which was at once seized by Kanakas and removed to be stacked for fuel. The juice-and the mill was just then pressing out 12,000 gallons a day-ran, somewhat the colour of dirty water, into the cast-iron receiver, and thence through a strainer, kept clear by a female Kanaka. By a powerful pump the juice was next pumped into a wooden gutter, which conducted it to the clarifiers, as required. In the clarifiers it was brought to boiling point, and around these vessels "boys" armed with paddle-shaped pieces of wood were skimming off the muddy-looking head of scum. Here the natural tendency to acidity in the juice was corrected, and subsequent granulation prevented, by the use of lime. In this process all impurities rose to the surface, to be at once skimmed off. Thus cleaned, the juice streamed through another wooden gutter into the batteries, two in number and each holding 1,800 gallons. The dusky ministering angels presiding over the amber-tinted seething liquid, now boiled into a bubbling foam, were, like their brethren at the clarifiers, occupied in skimming, with the difference that the scum removed at this stage was worth storing in a tank. The juice was boiled until it reached 22 degrees Beaumé ; time about three hours. Twelve feet below us four Kanakas were stoking at as many furnace mouths, and their coffee-coloured bodies and black heads contrasted well with the whitey-brown megass they thrust in, pushing themselves at the same time so well forward that they seemed in a fair way to become fuel

themselves. A white man was in charge of these battery furnaces, but the actual work was done by "boys."

Arrived at its proper density, the juice was ladled out of the batteries and conducted through pipes into four subsiders, where it settled for four-and-twenty hours, and in such a manner that it could be drawn off clear of sediment. The grand object throughout was to clear the juice of every scintilla of impurity. Finally skimmed in the heater, into which it was pumped by an ingenious bit of machinery, the juice next found its place in seven charcoal filters, and, taking leave of us there in that state, presented itself next as clear syrup. Each filter contained about two tons of charcoal, and through it the juice percolated into a tank, where it lost the brownish tint of its former existence and became transparent. Then came the vacuum pans, into which it was drawn as required, and in which it was boiled, to leave them a sticky compound of sugar and molasses.

He

Here it is that the sugar-maker's skill is put to the crucial test; here would be made the difference between good sugar and bad; for the art of sugar-boiling is to get as much grain as possible from the mass, and to be able to make it large or small at will. A little carelessness at this stage will spoil all. This was why, into the huge dome-shaped pan, a skilled operator continually thrust the "proof stick" (really an iron rod) to mark the course of the boiling. thus, so to speak, felt the pulse of the whole business, and the hammock slung close by showed that night and day, when the process was in operation, he must be on his watch-tower. At hand there were barometers, thermometers, steam gauges, and water gauges to be set one against another, and on the domed roof of the pan there was a circular glass of the peepshow pattern, through which the watcher commanded a view of the interior, where two tons of stuff could be accommodated. Descending to the next floor, this pan presented itself to us as a gigantic cast-iron egg, through the bottom of which there oozed the semi-liquid sugar, to travel its sluggish way through a wooden trough into the coolers. Outside, I had noticed that the primary machinery was worked by an engine of twenty horsepower; here I found that the vacuum pan required for its own purposes a twelve-horse engine to keep its air- and water-pumps in action. In the coolers we had arrived at a dark brown damp sugar, yet not so damp but that it was necessary to temper it with molasses to secure its free action in the centrifugal, a whirling cylinder making a thousand revolutions a minute. Into this cylinder the sugar was shovelled, the machinery was set in motion, and all that could be seen in the giddy movement was that the dark brown gradually faded into

white. In five minutes the mad whirligig was stopped, and its circular wall of gauze wire was caked with white sparkling sugar. The molasses had been driven through the minute perforations, but the true article remained as wheat remains on the threshing-floor.

Having now made our sugar, and while still upon the subject, a few more details may be added to complete the description of a sugar-mill in operation. During the last two minutes of the centrifugal's performance a "boy" had poured in, by means of a teapot, a pure solution of sugar-eau sucré considerably above proof-and this had cleansed and polished the crystals. The molasses were reboiled, and again reboiled, the sediment each time representing a sliding scale of inferior sugar. Passing through an open shed, where the temperature was less like a hot-house than that in which I had been perspiring, and having had pointed out to me, as representing some of the losses of the business, a quantity of disused machinery that four years ago was the fashionable system but was now sunker. capital, we breathed freely in the sugar-house where the prime sugar, direct from the centrifugals, was put into canvas bags and the second quality into "Madagascar pockets," each holding 70 lbs.

Like the New Testament ancients, the sugar-planters always seem to be seeking some new thing, so that upon one plantation the system adopted may be different from that of another. The speciality of the mills through the important portions of which I have conducted the reader was purification by charcoal. Other mills purified by boiling. Whether it was because of the charcoal I know not, but no one could deny that my mill produced a sugar that had never been beaten. The proprietor certainly had to pay for his fancy. The process of making charcoal was a manufacture in itself, and demanded its own premises. There I found a huge heap of calcined bones, retaining their original shape; a handmill to grind them in ; a winnowing machine to separate dust from the true charcoal; and upon the wooden partitions there were some bold chalk drawings of South Sea Island war canoes and birds and beasts, and a goodhumoured caricature of the manager of the plantation, all sketched in leisure moments by the light-hearted Polynesian. In one of the war canoes the steering man was putting "the thumb of derision to the nose of contempt "-proof that the artist had not lived for nought in an English colony.

It was always interesting to stroll through and around the mills. Had I been a dentist the pain, however, would have been too severe, for when the "boys" got to know me as an appanage of the proprietor or manager, whom they regard as a friend, they would show VOL. CCXLVII. NO. 1799.

R R

a “box of ivories" that would be the envy and despair of a professor of the dental art. I learned to like their merry, simple ways, and to see nothing incongruous in their uncovered skins, ranging from light coffee colour to black, according to their islands; whether going to and fro with burdens, wielding the ladles, tending the fires, or driving the horses, they were always quiet, plodding, and contented. The only puzzle was that these “boys,” who in their own country bask in the sun and allow such food as their women do not bring them to drop into their mouths, should voluntarily enter into servitude, and at once become amenable to discipline. Upon this particular plantation there were twenty white men to 109 Kanakas. There were 350 acres for crushing that year, and 500 acres additional available for future cultivation. The yield as a whole was averaging two tons to the acre, and the price of sugar at that period averaged £25 per But the year, both as to yield and the price of sugar, was unusually good.

ton.

Mackay is the sugar district par excellence of the colony, but there are districts farther north that may prove equally good; suitable climate, rich river scrubs, and available harbours are there. All that is wanted is capital. The law allows the employment of Kanakas within thirty miles of the coast, and the present Government are not enforcing even that restriction; and it is strenuously insisted by all who have practical acquaintance with sugar-growing, that it is impossible without coloured labour. The industry is increasing with rapid strides. Ten years ago the exports of sugar were returned at £41 in 1871, the first year when a comparison will hold, the amount was £16,262; in 1877, the official returns were £180,668; and 1879 will show a great increase upon that gratifying total. The first four years of sugar-growing in Queensland showed a steady increase, but in 1876, which was a disastrous year to the planters, the figures had sunk to £21,561; in the previous year they were £70,207; and in 1874, which was a very good season, they stood at £108,373. These figures will illustrate at one and the same time the extent of the industry, its possibilities, and its fluctuations. According to a competent authority, Queensland should have produced in 1879 not less than 15,000 tons cf sugar, which at, say, £25 per ton, represents a money value of £375,000. The cost of production, I am assured, would not be much more than half that

amount.

Sugar was first grown in Queensland in the East Moreton, which is, roughly speaking, the Brisbane district; but the first planter, though successful in producing cane, failed in getting sugar from it.

Nevertheless, the Government recognised his enterprise by a grant of 2,000 acres of land. The first sample of Queensland sugar was crushed on the Caboolture river, about thirty miles from Brisbane, and there subsequently sprang up on the Albert and Logan rivers plantations still in existence. The crops, however, in the southern portion of the Colony are liable to suffer from frost. Sugar was subsequently grown on the Mary river, where farmers still cultivate the cane largely.

But, as I have said, Mackay is the present centre of the richest plantations, and of the 15,000 tons estimated to be the yield of 1879, the Mackay fields would contribute 8,000 tons. The pioneer planter is Mr. Spiller, who owns two plantations, from which he anticipated to crush 2,250 tons. At the time of my visit, the early part of November, he had already crushed 1,375 tons, and there yet remained two months' work. Yet for years this gentleman hovered on the brink of disaster, and has only within the last two seasons reaped adequate reward for hardships endured and capital employed. In 1865, when he came to the district to try the experiment, the river banks were virgin tropical scrub, and the surrounding country out of the limits of civilisation. On one occasion the blacks surrounded the cottage in which Mrs. Spiller was alone, and for twelve hours she remained with loaded rifles by her side, barricaded and ready to open fire at the first sign of hostilities. Her husband, in view of such an eventuality (common enough even now in the unsettled districts), had taught her the use of firearms, and she would have made a good account of the foe if the occasion had arisen. The blacks, however, for some unaccountable reason, raised the siege, and departed without committing any serious mischief. In that district there are now sixteen large sugar plantations, equipped with all the latest improve

ments.

Two years after planting his cane Mr. Spiller, who had travelled in Java, and made himself acquainted with sugar-growing, crushed his first cane with rough, hard-wood, home-made rollers, and made half a ton of sugar. He was now able to show me the outgrowth of that modest effort, in the two extensive plantations which he owns. The largest is the River Estate plantation, which, at a push, has produced seventy tons of sugar in a week. He employs between four and five hundred hands. Yet until the year 1870 he was hopelessly blocked for want of machinery, the first properly appointed mill in the district being the Alexandra, owned by Mr. Davidson. Mr. Spiller is now pushing his sugar fields up the sides of hills where an ordinary observer would never think of planting; he has laid down a