INTO THE DUTCH EAST INDIES. 345 



holds good for the agriculture of all Europe, and we may say the same 

 (as far as we are acquainted with them) for the other parts of the world ; 

 but this is particularly the case with the culture in tropical districts, 

 and with European civilization in other parts of the world. The num- 

 berless host of crops of economical or technical nature belong, rarely, 

 or never, by nature, to the lands in which we see them raised,* But those 



ft 



cultivated plants are just the most useful of the whole earth. We seek 

 and find at last, without difficulty, all the circumstances that they require, 

 if the plants are not wholly unfit for the change of air and soil, which 

 quickly appears. Many plants for the commerce of Java, whose por- 

 duce, that of some at least, brings large sums annually to the treasury, 

 are not indigenous to that beautiful country, but have been brought to 

 it from elsewhere, — Coffees from Arabia, indigo from Southern Africa, 



w 



cmnamon from Ceylon, vanilla and nopal from Mexico, tobacco from 

 America, rice from China and" Japan, etc. Of some others the origin 

 is no longer to be known. Other plants were originally there, but spe- 

 cimens of them have also been imported from other places, and they all 

 succeed excellently. To expose all this in detail would be to commu- 

 nicate things already known.f 



The Island of Java must be considered as having not high alone, 

 but also low temperature, and different climates, even if it be not 

 known by experience. On one and the same island grow cocoa-palms 

 and species of oak ; from its plains to the diiFerent elevations are found 

 all the varieties of vegetation which are met with, from the equator to 

 the temperate zones. The plains of Java furnish the tropical flora in 



* Von Humboldt (and we cannot produce a greater authority) says in his Essay 

 ' Sur la Geographic des Plantes/p. 27 : "L'homme, inquiet et laborieui, en parcourant 

 les diverses parties du monde, a force un certain nombre de vegetaiix d'habiter toufl 

 les ciimats et toutes les hauteurs ; mais cet empire exerce sur ces etres organises n'a 

 point denature leur nature primitive. La pomme-de;terre, cultivee k ChiH h, trois 

 mille six cents metres de hauteur, porte la meme fleur que celle que Ton a introduite 

 dans les plaines de la Siberie. L'orge qui iiourrissait les chevaui d'AchiUe etait sana 

 doute la meme que nous semons aujourd'hui. Les formes caracteristiques des vege- 

 taiix et des animaux, que presente la surface actucUe du globe, ne paraissent avoir 

 subi aucun changement depuia les epoques les plus reculees," etc. 



t Humboldt says (p. 27), "C'est ainsi que Thomme change ^ son gre la sur- 

 face du globe et rassemble autour de lui les plautes des climata les plus eloig 

 Bans les colonics EnroDeennes des deux Indcs tm netit terrain cultive presente lecafe 



'Arable 



eres 



Others think indigo an Indian plant. 



although from the different information and opinions wc mc 

 18 uncertain.— See Roib. M. Ind. iii. 379 . Wight and An 

 lU. Himal. t. 195 ; Alph. dc Candollp Geogr. Rot. ii. 854. 



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