SUGAR FROM COAL TAR.

Timaru Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 3687, 27 July 1886, Page 3

SUGAR FROM COAL TAR.

* It appears that we may hare a sugar manufactory m our midst without either the growth of sugar-cane or beet-root. This will be good news to the sweet- toothed, who, judging from the number of thriving confectioners, must be a very numerous class. We have long beoa Uught the lesion that there is nothing but what may be made a eood use of if we only know the way how. There is no such a thing as bad rubbish. Materials which a European despises become an article of commerce with Celestials. Among things lons considered useless was coal gas tar. Now beautiful dyes can be extracted from it, and it has proved to be an excellent ingredient m asphalting our side pavement). This is nothing m importance as compared with its latest product. A German chemist has found a new substance m coal-tar which he has named saccharin. It is two hundred and twenty times sweeter than the best cane sugar. It has several benefi-.-ial qualities, as it can be used where cane sugar cannot, such as sweetening the food of patients suffering from diabetes. It has been already adopted for this purpose m one of the Berlin hospitals. The only drawback is its cost, which is at present 40s per Ib. Saccharin lollies would therefore be expensive. But if this essence be so very powerful a small quantity might sweeten a ton of flour, thickened with chalk, as some of our imported sweeties undoubtedly are. What a marvel it is that tiie canes forming part of coal deposits should hare their sweet juices extracted many thousands of years after they grew auH flour shed m the tropical heats which then prevailed. We congratulate the City Council on the new lource of wealth. tb.u,» opening up to them. I '

The Gasworks m their profit may jet relieve the citizens of ordinary assessment. — Dunediit Evening Herald.