to a pile on the other side.

This crushed cane (bagazo), falling from between the rollers, is
gathered into baskets by men and women, who carry it on their heads into
the fields and spread it for drying. There it is watched and tended as
carefully as new-mown grass in haymaking, and raked into cocks or
windrows, on an alarm of rain. When dry, it is placed under sheds for
protection against wet. From the sheds and from the fields, it is loaded
into carts and drawn to the furnace doors, into which it is thrown by
Negroes, who crowd it in by the armful, and rake it about with long
poles. Here it feeds the perpetual fires by which the steam is made, the
machinery moved, and the cane-juice boiled. The care of the bagazo is
an important part of the system; for if that becomes wet and fails, the
fires must stop, or resort be had to wood, which is scarce and
expensive.

Thus, on one side of the rollers is the ceaseless current of fresh,
full, juicy cane-stalks, just cut from the open field; and on the other
side, is the crushed, mangled, juiceless mass, drifting out at the
draught, and fit only to be cast into the oven and burned. This is the
way of the world, as it is the course of art. The cane is made to
destroy itself. The ruined and corrupted furnish the fuel and fan the
flame that lures on and draws in and crushes the fresh and wholesome;
and the operation seems about as mechanical and unceasing in the one
case as in the other.

From the rollers, the juice falls below into a large receiver, from
which it flows into great, open vats, called defecators. These
defecators are heated by the exhaust steam of the engine, led through
them in pipes. All the steam condensed forms water, which is returned
warm into the boiler of the engine. In the defecators, as their name
denotes, the scum of the juice is purged off, so far as heat alone will
do it. From the last defecator, the juice is passed through a trough
into the first caldron. Of the caldrons, there is a series, or, as they
call it, a train, through all which the juice must go. Each caldron is a
large, deep, copper vat, heated very hot, in which the juice seethes and
boils. At each, stands a strong Negro, with long, heavy skimmer in hand,
stirring the juice and skimming off the surface. This scum is collected
and given to the hogs, or thrown upon the muck heap, and is said to be
very fructifying. The juice is ladled from one caldron to the next, as
fast as the office of