t
slowly. From a trough, open at the lower end, a thick liquid was
flowing, called "molasses," or treacle, which is used for making rum,
gingerbread, and for other purposes. The lowest part of the sugar-loaf
seemed, also, to be yellow and sticky.

Passing through a dark passage, Lucien noticed two half-naked laborers,
who were moistening clay and converting it into a kind of dough.

"What a nasty mess!" he cried, with a self-satisfied tone. "What would
mamma say, if she was here? It was only the other day she gave my
brother and sister a good scolding."

"What was it for?" I asked.

"For mixing up mud to build a town and reservoir in the long passage in
our house."

"What part did you take in it?"

"Oh, I was architect; but I was scolded as much as the others."

"That I can readily believe," replied Sumichrast, who could hardly keep
his gravity; "but come, let us follow these laborers, and you will soon
see that they are not mixing up this mud for mere pleasure."

To his great surprise, our little traveller saw them filling up, with a
dark-colored liquid, the empty part of the moulds, from which the
molasses had drained away.

"They are spoiling the sugar-loaves!" he cried.

"Quite the contrary; they are going to whiten it. The water that is
contained in the clay will filter gradually through the sugar, and will
drive before it the molasses that is left round the crystals; and this
operation, several times repeated, will produce that spongy kind of
sugar which is well known to retain a flavor of the cane, rather
disliked by Europeans accustomed to the finer products of their
refineries."

The only department we now had to visit was the "drying-room," where
the sugar-loaves are piled up to dry, and wait for a purchaser.

In our way thither we nearly fell into an immense reservoir, level with
the surface of the ground, and full of molasses; the scum floating on
the top so exactly resembled the rough and sticky floor of the
sugar-mill that it was easy to make a mistake. Gringalet was unfortunate
enough to be the cause of our avoiding this accident. Restless, like all
his kind, he ran smelling about in every direction, just as if he was
trying to find some lost object: forcing his way between our legs, to
get in front of us, he suddenly disappeared in the thick liquid. I
pulled him out directly; but as soon as he was on his feet, he rolled
over and over on the ground, so that when he stood up his coat was
br