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(an idea tersely suggested by Perrine, and for the successful application 

 of which, as I read, a large sum was later paid to another) the pulp 

 is removed. The fiber, suitably washed and dried, is then baled for 

 export. In the state of Vera Cruz a plant of the same group has 

 recently come into local prominence, and is said to be considerably 

 planted under the name ' zapupe,' and to yield an excellent fiber. 



One of the agaves longest known in gardens is that for which bot- 

 anists are now restoring the name A. Vera Cruz which Miller applied 

 to it, following its earlier polynomial designation of 'Aloe America 

 ex Vera Cruce foliis latioribus et glaucis.' Like the henequen, it 

 yields a fiber for which it is somewhat cultivated in the state of Vera 

 Cruz; and I understand that it is this species to which the 'Agave 

 Americana' of Indian fiber-culture reports refers. 



In India, for a century and a half or more, has been known another 

 agave which is properly called A. Cantula, though it is frequently 



Fig. 15. Palma Zamandoque. 



spoken of under the name A. Eoxburgliii, which was given to it later. 

 Erroneously, it is even more often designated by the name A. vivipara, 

 which, as used by Linnams, belongs to a very different plant common 

 in the Greater Antilles. This species, the source of a considerable 

 quantity of Indian fiber which is known in the market as Bombay aloe, 

 and of a small but increasing amount of Philippine fiber under the 

 name ' Manila aloe,' is a close relative of the Tequila mezcal. Ade- 

 quate study will probably result in its final positive identification 

 with some American species; but at present it shares with another 

 Indian species of the same group the distinction of representing in Asia 

 a genus otherwise exclusively American — if the generally discredited 

 hypothesis that the century plant is indigenous to the Mediterranean 

 region be not true. 



In comparison with the great cultures of henequen, all of the other 



