Professor Morchand and others affirm that a solution of pure sugar has no injurious effect upon the teeth, the popular notion to the contrary notwithstanding. Neither is pure or refined sugar, taken in moderate quantities, injurious to the blood, or the stomach, unless the stomach be very weak. In order to cure my children of an inordinate appetite for sugar, I have repeatedly obtained a pound of pure white lump, and set it before each, respectively, allowing it to eat as much as it chose. Failing, in one case out of three, to surfeit the child with one pound, I purchased six pounds in a box, and taking off the cover, I placed the whole temptingly before her. This cloyed her, and now she does not take sugar in her tea.
A CONFECTIONERY STORE.
I have never known serious results accruing from children eating large quantities of purified sugar; yet I would not advise it to be given them in excess, excepting for the above purpose, viz., “to cure them of an inordinate appetite for sugar.”
Now try to break the child of an excessive appetite for candy by giving it large quantities at once, and nine times out of ten you will have a sick or dead child in the house for your rash experiment.
Hence your candies, “nine times out of ten,” will be found to contain injurious or poisonous substances.
Refined Sugar.
Sugar is an aliment and condiment. It is also, medically, an alterative and a demulcent. Finely pulverized loaf sugar and gum arabic, in equal proportions, form an excellent and soothing compound for inflamed throats, catarrh, and nasal irritations, to be taken dry, by mouth and nostrils, and often repeated.
Pure loaf sugar is white, brittle, inodorous, permanent in the air, and of a specific gravity of 1.6. It is chemically expressed thus: C24, H22, O22. It is nutritious to a certain extent, but alone will not support life for an unlimited length of time. This is owing to the entire absence of nitrogen in its composition. By analysis, sugar is resolved into carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen.
Pulverized sugar is often adulterated with starch, flour, magnesia, and sometimes silex and terra alba. Loaf sugar, however, is usually found to be pure.