"I don't think I ever realized that before," said Van thoughtfully.

"Why, even my father remembers when, as a little shaver, he used to
have white sugar spread on his bread for a treat."

"Seems queer, doesn't it?" Van mused.

"Yes. But it isn't so queer when you consider that all the sugar-cane
now growing in America first had to be brought to the West Indies
from Spain, the Canary Islands, or Madeira and then transplanted
along the Mississippi delta. Dad says that originally sugar-cane came
from Africa or India and that doubtless it was the Crusaders who
introduced it into Europe."

"Do you mean to tell me that people never knew about sugar until
then?" inquired Van incredulously, halting in the middle of the
road.

"The Chinese were practically the only people who did, and they did
not use it at all as we do; they just sweetened things with the thin
sap."

Van regarded his chum steadily for a moment.

"Say," he demanded at last, "how did you come to know so much,
Bobbie?"

"What? Oh, about sugar? I don't know much. I just happen to remember
a few scraps Father has told me from time to time. He's in the sugar
business, you know."