To insure a successful outcome from the operations of the factory, the cane must be so planted, cultivated and matured as to make the sugar in its juice.  It must be delivered to the factory very soon after cutting, and it must be taken care of before the season of heavy frosts.

THE WORK AT THE FACTORY.

The operations of the factory are illustrated in the large diagram.  The first cutting is accomplished in the ensilage or feed cutter at E. This cutter is provided with three knives fastened to the three spokes of a cast iron wheel which makes about 250 revolutions per minute, carrying the knives with a shearing motion past a dead knife.  By a forced feed the cane is so fed as to be cut into pieces about one and a quarter inches long.  This cutting frees the leaves and nearly the entire sheaths from the pieces of cane.  By a suitable elevator, F, the pieces of cane, leaves and sheaths are carried to the second floor.

The elevator empties into a hopper, below which a series of four or five fans, G, is arranged one below the other.  By passing down through these fans the cane is separated from the lighter leaves, much as grain is separated from chaff.  The leaves are blown away, and finally taken from the building by an exhaust fan.  This separation of the leaves and other refuse is essential to the success of the sugar making, for in them the largest part of the coloring and other deleterious matters are contained.  If carried into the diffusion battery, these matters are extracted (see reports of Chemical Division, U.S.  Department of Agriculture), and go into the juice with the sugar.  As already stated, the process of manufacturing sugar is essentially one of separation.  The mechanical elimination of these deleterious substances at the outset at once obviates the necessity of separating them later and by more difficult methods, and relieves the juice of their harmful influences.  From the fans the pieces of cane are delivered by a screw carrier to an elevator which discharges into the final cutting machine on the third floor.  This machine consists of an eight inch cast iron cylinder, with knives like those of a planing machine.  It is really three cylinders placed end to end in the same shaft, making the entire length eighteen inches.  The knives are inserted in slots and held in place with set screws.  The cylinder revolves at the rate of about twelve hundred per minute, carrying the knives past an iron dead knife, which is set so close that no cane can pass without being cut into fine chips.  From this cutter the chips of cane are taken by an elevator and a conveyer, K, to cells, MM, of the diffusion battery.  The conveyer passes above and at one side of the battery, and is provided with an opening and a spout opposite each cell of the battery.  The openings are closed at pleasure by a slide.  A movable spout completes the connection with any cell which it is desired to fill with chips.