t a
beautiful yellow granular sugar was obtained, from which not a
single drop of molasses drained, and it did not deliquesce by
exposure to the air. Another lot of the sap, reduced to sugar
without lime-water, granulated, but not so well, was sour to the
taste, deliquesced by exposure, and gave a considerable quantity of
molasses.

Having studied the nature of the peculiar acid of the maple, I found
that its combinations with lime were excessively soluble in alcohol,
so that the yellow sugar first described could be rendered white in
a few minutes, by placing it in an inverted cone open at the bottom,
and pouring a fresh quantity of alcohol upon it, and allowing it to
filtrate through the sugar. The whitened sugar was then taken and
re-dissolved in boiling water and crystallised, by which all the
alcoholic flavour was entirely removed, and a perfectly fine
crystallised and pure sugar resulted. Now, in the large way, I
advise the following method of manufacturing maple sugar. Obtain
several large copper or brass kettles, and set them up in a row,
either by tripods with iron rings, or by hanging them on a
cross-bar; clean them well, then collect the sap in buckets, if
possible, so that but little rain-water will be mixed with the sap,
and take care not to have any dead leaves in it. For every gallon of
the maple sap _add one measured ounce_ of clear lime-water, pass the
sap into the first kettle and evaporate; then, when it is reduced to
about one-half, dip it out into the second kettle, and skim it each
time; then into the next, and so on, until it has reached the last,
where it is reduced to syrup, and then may be thrown into a trough,
and granulated by beating it up with an oar.

As soon as the first kettle is nearly empty, pour in a new lot of
the sap, and so continue working it forward exactly after the manner
of the West India sugar-boilers. The crude sugar may be refined
subsequently, or at the time of casting it into the cones made of
sheet iron, well painted with white lead and boiled linseed oil, and
thoroughly dried, so that no paint can come off. These cones are to
be stopped at first, until the sugar is cold; then remove the
stopper and pour on the base of the cone a quantity of strong
whiskey, or fourth proof rum. Allow this to nitrate through, until
the sugar