Cooley's Cyclopaedia of Practical Receipts Volume Ii Part 241

=Sugar, Maple.= _Syn._ SACCHARUM ACERINUM, L. From the juice of the sugar maple. It is identical with cane sugar.

In the United States and the British Colonies of North America considerable quant.i.ties of this sugar are made. The juice is obtained by boring through the bark of the tree to a depth of about a quarter or half an inch. Each tree has generally two perforations made in it, and they are always made on that side of the tree which faces towards the south, and at a distance of about 20 inches from the ground. The juice flows into suitable vessels, into which it is conducted by reeds placed under the perforations. The period chosen for tapping the trees is that during which it is known the sap is ascending, from March to May. Sometimes the tree undergoes a second tapping in the autumn, but this is not generally practised, inasmuch as it is injurious to the tree. A daily yield of 6 galls, of juice from each incision is looked upon as a 'good run,' and if this 6 gall. be the produce of an old tree or 'old bush' they will yield 1 lb. of sugar. In a young tree or 'young bush' the yield of sugar from the same quant.i.ty of sap is only half. By proper care the same tree may be tapped 20 or 30 years following. Unlike the sugar-cane the juice in the maple is the richest in sugar the higher it is found from the ground. The concentrated saccharine liquid is concentrated every 24 hours. The raw crystallised sugar undergoes no refining, and being made into blocks is then sent to market.

=Sugar, Milk.= C_{12}H_{22}O_{11}.H_{2}O. _Syn._ SUGAR OF MILK, LACTIN; SACCHARUM LACTIS (Ph. D.), L. _Prep._ Gently evaporate clarified whey until it crystallises on cooling, and purify the crystals by digestion with animal charcoal and repeated crystallisations.

_Prop., &c._ White, translucent, very hard cylindrical ma.s.ses or four-sided prisms; soluble in about 6 parts of cold and in 2 parts of boiling water; nearly insoluble in alcohol and ether; ammoniacal plumbic acetate precipitates it from its solutions. When an alkaline solution of grape sugar is boiled with the salts of copper, silver, or mercury, it reduces them; it produces right-handed rotation of a ray of polarised light; by boiling with dilute acid it is converted into _galactose_ (C_{6}H_{12}O_{6}); treated with nitric acid it yields mucic acid, with small quant.i.ties of saccharic, oxalic, and tartaric acid. Milk sugar is unsusceptible of the vinous fermentation, except under the action of dilute acids, which convert it into grape sugar; in solution, it is converted into lactic or butyric acid by the action of caseine and alb.u.minous matter. Milk contains about 5% of it. (Boussingault.)

_Obs._ Sugar of milk is chiefly imported from Switzerland. In this country it is chiefly used as a vehicle for more active medicines, especially among the h.o.m.opathists.

=Sugar, Starch.= _Syn._ POTATO SUGAR, FaeCULA S. This is grape sugar obtained by the action of diastase on starch, in the manner noticed under GUM (British), or by the action of dilute sulphuric acid on starch, or of the strong acid on lignin, or on substances containing it.

_Prep._ 1. From corn. The corn is first steeped in soda lye; it is then ground wet and pa.s.sed through revolving sieves to separate the husks and gluten. The starch is carried through long troughs, in which are placed transverse pieces of wood, against which the solid particles of starch lodge, and are thus separated from the washing waters. These wash waters run into a large cistern, where it undergoes fermentation into weak vinegar. The starch in the wet state is then put into a mash tub and treated for from 3 to 8 hours with 1 per cent. of sulphuric acid. The acid liquor is neutralised with chalk and evaporated in vacuum pans; and after being separated from the sulphate of lime it is run into barrels and allowed to crystallise. The grape sugar is sometimes manufactured in blocks 6 inches square, and dried on plaster plates in a current of dry air, as hot air would decolorise it. Large quant.i.ties of grape sugar manufactured as above are now produced in the United States, particularly in New Orleans, Buffalo, and Brooklyn. A considerable amount from the same source reaches this country from the Continent, and is employed in our breweries. When specially prepared for the use of the latter the blocks are crushed into small pieces about the size of malt grains. Our excise authorities prohibit the entrance of glucose into a brewer's premises in the liquid state. In the brewing of pale sparkling ales grape is esteemed more than either cane sugar or malt, and is said to yield a more sound and wholesome liquor, and one free from the acidity, impurity, and treacly sweetness frequently found in beers brewed from raw or inferior sugars.

Glucose may also be obtained from cellulose, but the process is too expensive to admit of being practically worked.

2. Potato starch, 100 parts; water, 00 parts; sulphuric acid, 6 parts; mix, boil for 35 or 40 hours, adding water, to make up for evaporation; then saturate the acid with lime or chalk, decant or filter, and evaporate the clear liquor. Under pressure the conversion is more rapid. _Prod._ 105%.

3. "The starch of potatoes can be converted into glucose by digestion for a few hours with parings of the potato. This operation is largely practised by German farmers in the preparation of food for fattening hogs.

An excellent starch sugar can be prepared from Indian corn, which will yield alcohol one eighth cheaper, and quite as pure as that from cane sugar."[208]

[Footnote 208: 'Journ. of Applied Chemistry.']

4. Shreds of linen or paper, 12 parts; strong sulphuric acid, 17 parts (Braconnot; 5 of acid, and 1 of water--Vogel); mix in the cold; in 24 hours dilute with water, and boil it for 10 hours; then neutralise with chalk, filter, evaporate to a syrup, and set the vessel aside to crystallise. _Prod._ 114%. Sawdust, glue, &c., also yield grape sugar by like treatment. See LIGNIN.

=Sugar from other Sources.= Considerable quant.i.ties of East Indian cane sugar are yielded by certain Indian palms, the princ.i.p.al of which are the _Arenga saccharifera_ and the _Phnix sylvestris_ or wild date. Another source whence large quant.i.ties of cane sugar are procured is the _Sorghum saccharatum_ or sugar gra.s.s. This plant is exclusively grown in Ohio, and yields annually more than 15,000,000 gall. of juice, which is made into sugar.

_Melezitose_ (C_{12}H_{22}O_{11}). From larch manna.

_Mycose_ or _trehalose_ (C_{12}H_{22}O_{11}). From Turkish manna.

_Melitose_ (C_{12}H_{24}O_{12}). From the eucalyptus.

_Maltose_ (C_{12}H_{24}O_{12}). From malt.

_Eucalen_ (C_{6}H_{12}O_{6}). By fermentation of melitose.

_Sorbin_ (C_{6}H_{12}O_{6}). From the berries of the service tree.

_Effects of the varieties of Sugar on Polarised Light._ Both sucrose, or cane sugar, and dextrose produce rotation upon a ray of polarised light.

The plane of rotation is rotated to the right by sucrose rather more powerfully than by dextrose. It is remarkable that the uncrystallisable sugar of fruits produces an opposite rotation, viz. to the left. Since the degree of rotation is proportionate in columns of equal length to the quant.i.ty of sugar present, it has been proposed to employ this property in order to determine the quant.i.ty of sugar present in syrups.[209] The following, according to Berthelot, are the rotatory powers of the different varieties of sugar, if equal weights of each are dissolved in an equal bulk of water; the quant.i.ties of each sugar are calculated for the formulae annexed:

[Footnote 209: Miller.]

+----------------------+--------------------+-----------+-----------------+ Temperature. Variety. Formula. Rotation. Fahr. Cent. +----------------------+--------------------+-----------+--------+--------+ Sucrose (cane sugar) (C_{12}H_{22}O_{11}) Right 738 Melezitose (C_{12}H_{22}O_{11}) " 941 Mycose (C_{12}H_{22}O_{11}) " 193 Melitose (C_{12}H_{24}O_{12}) " 102 Dextrose (grape sugar) (C_{6}H_{12}O_{6}) " 574 Malt sugar (C_{6}H_{12}O_{6}) " 172 Lvulose (fruit sugar) (C_{6}H_{12}O_{6}) Left 106 56 133 Eucalin (C_{6}H_{12}O_{6}) Right 50 Sorbin (C_{6}H_{12}O_{6}) Left 469 Lactose (milk sugar) (C_{6}H_{12}O_{6}) Right 564 Glucose of ditto (galactose) (C_{6}H_{12}O_{6}) " 833 Inverted cane sugar (C_{6}H_{12}O_{6}) Left 28 57 139 +----------------------+--------------------+-----------+--------+--------+

=SUGAR-BOILING.= The art or business of the confectioner or sugar-baker; the candying of sugar. The stages are as follow:--Well clarified and perfectly transparent syrup is boiled until a 'skimmer' dipped into it, and a portion 'touched' between the forefinger and thumb, on opening them, is drawn into a small thread, which crystallises and breaks. This is called a 'weak candy height.' If boiled again, it will draw into a larger string, and if bladders may be blown through the 'drippings' from the ladle, with the mouth, it has acquired the second degree, and is now called 'bloom sugar.' After still further boiling, it arrives at the state called 'feathered sugar.' To determine this re-dip the skimmer, and shake it over the pan, then give it a sudden flirt behind, and the sugar will fly off like feathers. The next degree is that of 'crackled sugar,' in which state the sugar that hangs to a stick dipped into it, and put directly into a pan of cold water, is not dissolved off, but turns hard and snaps. The last stage of refining this article reduces it to what is called 'carmel sugar,' proved by dipping a stick first into the sugar, and then into cold water, when, on the moment it touches the latter, it will, if matured, snap like gla.s.s. It has now arrived at a 'full candy height.'

Care must be taken throughout that the fire is not too fierce, as, by flaming up against the sides of the pan, it will burn and discolour the sugar; hence the boiling is best conducted by steam heat.

Any flavour or colour may be given to the candy by adding the colouring matter to the syrup before boiling it, or the flavouring essences when the process is nearly complete. See STAINS, &c.

=SUGAR CAN'DY.= _Syn._ SACCHARUM CANDIDUM, S. CRYSTALLINUM, S.

CRYSTALLIZATUM, L. Sugar crystallised by leaving the saturated syrup in a warm place (90 to 100 Fahr.), the shooting being promoted by placing sticks, or threads, at small distances from each other in the liquor; it is also deposited from compound syrups, and does not seem to retain much of the foreign substances with which they are loaded. Brown sugar candy is prepared in this way from raw sugar; white do., from refined sugar; and red do., from a syrup of refined sugar which has been coloured red by means of cochineal.

Sugar candy is chiefly used as a sweetmeat; and, being longer in dissolving than sugar, in coughs, to keep the throat moist; reduced to powder, it is also blown into the eye, as a mild escharotic in films or dimness of that organ.

=SUGAR OF LEAD.= Acetate of lead.

=SUGAR PLUMS.= _Syn._ BON-BONS, DRAGeES, Fr. These are made by various methods, among which are those noticed under DROPS (Confectionery), LOZENGES, and PASTILS, to which may be added the following:--Take a quant.i.ty of sugar syrup, in the proportion to their size, in that state called a 'blow' (which may be known by dipping the skimmer into the sugar, shaking it, and blowing through the holes, when parts of light may be seen), and add a drop or two of any esteemed flavouring essence. If the 'bon-bons' are preferred white, when the sugar has cooled a little, stir it round the pan till it grains and shines on the surface. When all is ready, pour it through a funnel into little clean, bright, leaden moulds, which must be of various shapes, and be previously slightly moistened with oil of sweet almonds; it will then take a proper form and harden. As soon as the plums are cold, take them from the moulds; dry them for two or three days in the air, and put them upon paper. If the bon-bons are required to be coloured, add the colour just as the sugar is ready to be taken off the fire.

CRYSTALLISED BON-BONS are prepared by dusting them with powdered double-refined lump sugar before drying them.

LIQUEUR BON-BONS, now so beautifully got up by the Parisian confectioners, are obtained by pressing pieces of polished bone or metal into finely powdered sugar, filling the hollow s.p.a.ces so formed with saturated solutions of sugar in the respective liqueurs, and then spreading over the whole an ample layer of powdered sugar. In the course of three or four days the bon-bons may be removed, and tinted by the artist at will.

Instead of white powdered sugar ordered above, coloured sugar may be used.

These bon-bons are found to be hollow spheres, containing a small quant.i.ty of the spirit or liqueur employed, and will bear keeping for many months.

See SWEETMEATS, &c.

=SUGARS (Medicated).= _Syn._ SACCHARIDES; SACCHARA MEDICATA, L.; SACCHAROLeS, SACCHARURES, Fr. Some of these are prepared by moistening white sugar with the medicinal substance, then gently drying it, and rubbing it to powder; in other cases they are obtained in the manner noticed under PULVERULENT EXTRACTS, or OLEOSACCHARUM. The most valuable preparation of this cla.s.s in British pharmacy is the saccharated carbonate of iron (FERRI CARBONAS c.u.m SACCHARO--Ph. L.).

=SUINT, Gas from.= By this is understood a gas prepared from the fatty materials present in the soap-suds used in washing raw wool and spun yarns. The water containing the suint and soap-suds is run into cisterns, and is there mixed with milk of lime, and left to stand for twelve hours.

A thin precipitate is formed, which, after the supernatant clear liquor has been run off, is put upon coa.r.s.e canvas for the purpose of draining off any impurities, sand, hair, &c., while the ma.s.s which runs through the filter is put into a tank, in which it forms, after six or eight days, a pasty ma.s.s, which, having been dug out and moulded into bricks, is dried in open air. At Rheims the first wash-water of the wool is used for making both gas and potash, because the water contains no soap and only suintate of potash. Havrez, at Verviers, has recently proposed to employ suint--which, by-the-bye, is very rich in nitrogen--for the purpose of making ferrocyanide of pota.s.sium.

The dried brick-shaped lumps are submitted to distillation, yielding a gas which does not require purification, and which possesses an illuminating power three times that of good coal gas. The wash-water of a wool-spinning mill with 20,000 spindles yields daily, when treated as described, about 500 kilos of dried suinter, as the substance is technically called. One kilo of this substance yields 210 litres of gas. Annually about 150,000 kilos of suinter are obtained, and this quant.i.ty will yield 31,500,000 litres = 1,112,485 cubic feet of gas. Every burner consuming 35 litres of gas per hour, and taking the time of burning at 1200 hours, the quant.i.ty of gas will suffice for 750 burners, and as a spinning mill of 20,000 spindles only requires 500 burners, there is an excess of gas supply available for 250 other burners, or the owner may dispose of 5000 kilos of suinter, which is valued at Augsburgh at about 3s. per 50 kilos, and at about 4s. at Mulhouse.[210]

[Footnote 210: Wagner's 'Chemical Technology.']

=SUL'PHATE.= _Syn._ SULPHAS, L. A salt of sulphuric acid.

=SUL'PHIDE.= A salt consisting of sulphur and a metal or other basic radical. See SULPHURETTED HYDROGEN.

=SULPHINDYL'IC ACID.= _Syn._ SULPHINDIGOTIC ACID. An intensely blue pasty ma.s.s, formed by dissolving 1 part of indigo in about 15 parts of concentrated sulphuric acid. See SULPHATE OF INDIGO.

=SUL'PHITE.= A salt of sulphurous acid.

=SULPHOCARBOLIC ACID.= (SULPHOCARBOLATES.) Carbolic acid, when acted upon by bases, yields a cla.s.s of salts termed carbolates. These compounds are very unstable; they readily absorb water from the air, which sets free carbolic acid; they usually have the powerful odour of the latter. When, however, equivalent weights of carbolic and sulphuric acids are mixed, union takes place, a definite double acid (sulphocarbolic) results, and the salts formed by this double acid with the various bases are entirely different from the simple salts of carbolic acid. They are very stable, very soluble, possess neither odour nor taste of carbolic acid, and are singularly beautiful in crystalline form.

=Sulphocarbolic Acid= (HC_{6}H_{3}SO_{4}) is obtained by the crystallisation in long colourless needles; unlike carbolic acid, it is soluble in water, alcohol, and ether, in any proportions.

=Sulphocarbolate of Calcium= [Ca(C_{6}H_{5}SO_{4})_{2} + Aq.] is obtained in very long, fine, densely interlacing crystals, which form in bulk, by their interlacement, a porous ma.s.s. Unlike the usual lime-salts, this is exceedingly soluble. This fact overcomes the great difficulty of treatment when in disease there is a deficiency of lime in the body, especially in rickets, in which disease the want of lime in the bones gives rise to distortions. The sulphocarbolate of magnesium crystallises in large, clear, rhombic prisms, easily soluble in water.

=Sulphocarbolate of Copper= [Cu(C_{6}H_{5}SO_{4})_{2}] forms fine prismatic crystals of a blue colour. It is used as the zinc sulphocarbolate, chiefly as a lotion and dressing, in the proportion of 3 to 10 grains to the ounce of distilled water.

=Sulphocarbolate of Iron= [Fe(C_{6}H_{5}SO_{4})_{2}] is in colourless or pale green rhombic plates. It is readily administered, and seems in some instances to be preferred to other salts of iron. It seems to have been of especial use in the skin diseases of children, wherein there is much formation of matter.

=Sulphocarbolate of Sodium= [Na(C_{6}H_{5})SO_{4}.Aq] is in brilliant, clear, rhombic prisms. The salt is very soluble in water. This salt can be administered as a medicine in doses of 20 to 60 gr.; it is slowly decomposed in the textures, carbolic acid being evolved. It thus becomes a very simple means of obtaining the beneficial effects of the administration of this antiseptic without the difficulties and dangers which attend it in its uncombined irritant and caustic form. It has proved of great service in the treatment of infectious diseases. Administered in the severest cases of diphtheria, malignant scarlet fever, typhoid, erysipelas, &c., the remedy has proved of extreme value.

=Sulphocarbolate of Zinc= [Zn(C_{6}H_{5}SO_{4})_{2}] is chiefly employed in solution as a lotion. By high surgical authorities it is considered to answer all the purposes of the antiseptic dressing of carbolic acid. It is inodorous, and has very slight irritating action.

=The Sulphocarbolates of Pota.s.sium= [KC_{6}H_{5}SO_{4}] =and Ammonium= [NH_{4}C_{6}H_{5}SO_{4}] are also brilliant crystals; they are freely soluble, administered with the greatest ease, and have been used with success as remedial agents.

=SULPHOCYAN'OGEN.= A well-defined salt radical, containing sulphur united to the elements of cyanogen. Its compounds are the sulphocyanides, most of which may be formed by directly saturating hydrosulphocyanic acid with the oxide or hydrate of the base; or, from the sulphocyanide of pota.s.sium and a soluble salt of the base, by double decomposition.