96 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[August i, 1883. 



OiNNAiiON" AND Cassia VEiiA. — From time to time re- 

 ference hus been made iu this counti-y to the iui vantages pre- 

 sented by the arrangemeiit midcr which in the Cuiled 

 States imports ot" drugs of inferior quality are inter- 

 cepted at the custom house ; but in the light of a 

 statement in one of our exchanges this guanhanship 

 ■would appear to be a broken reed to lean upon. Accordiug 

 to the Oif, Faint and fJruy Rtjforter an apphcation was 

 made recently to the bureau of statistit^s at Washington 

 for infonu.ition as to the quantity of '• cassia vem " annually 

 imported into the country. The preliminary (jnestion, •' What 

 is cass a vera?" proved a stumbling block, and after it had 

 been passed from one t mplmjv to another it was discovered 

 that the sum total of the kuowlt-dge on the subject poss- 

 essed by the custom-house experts was that there are two 

 articles of a similar character, called cinnamon and cassia, 

 the former coming from Ceylon and paying a duty of 

 twenty cents per pound, the other coming from China and 

 paying only half that amount of duty. Inquiries spread 

 over a wider area raised the doubt whether the greater part 

 of the cinnamon imported into the United States dui'ing 

 recent years has not been entered — and passed — as cassia, 

 payment of the higher rate of duty being thus avoided. — 

 Pharmaceutical Journal. 



Cacao: How to Gkow ant) How to Cite e it By D. 

 MoHRis, M. A., F. G. S. London : S. W. Silver and Co. — 

 Thi s little manual contjiins the substance of a lecture de- 

 livered under the auspices of the Institute of Jamaica by 

 the indefatigable Director of Public Gardens and Plant- 

 ations in that island, which had for its primary object the 

 diffusion of information respecting the cultivation and 

 preparation of cucoa, with a view to a further development 

 of the industry. ^Vfter historical and descriptive accounts 

 of the cacao plant, the author deals with the methods of 

 cultivation, the gathering of the crop, and the subsequent 

 sweating and curing of the beans, and he also gives some 

 information valuable to intending planters as to the co«t 

 of estabUshing a cacao estate and its relation to the 

 average jield of the trees. "We learn that a good cacao tree 

 iu good soil yeilds from fifty to several hundred poJs per 

 annum ; the average for well cultivated trees at seven years 

 old is between eighty and one hundred pods, about eleven 

 pods being required to yield one pound of cured c^cao. 

 Certainly the author holds out a tempting inducement to 

 those in a position t<i take up the cidtivatiou in Jamaica, 

 for the tells them that by combining on the same plantation 

 the cultivation of the cacao and the banana, sufficient profit 

 may be derived from the sale of the banana fruit to cover 

 the entire expenditin-e diuiug the fii-st four or five years 

 required for the maturation of the cacao plants. The 

 book contains a consitlei-able amount of interesting reading,' 

 though many of the details will bt: of use only to those 

 who can give them practical application. — Fkarmaceuiical 

 Journal. 



ScALK Insects ok xjie Okaxcie. — Of all the insecticides 

 whi.'h havtr been tried by vaiious parties, nothing has as 

 yet been tliscovered to ecjual a prcpar kerosene emulsion as 

 the most effectual destroyer of scale insects and their eggs. 

 The only want of complete success with this has been the 

 failure of properly combiuing the ingrethents and con- 

 sequently the use of a very imperfect emulsion. The 

 thorough combining of this mixtm-e is better desci'ibed as 

 churning, and for this purpose a force pump, such as is 

 used for spraying orange trees, is found to be the best. 

 " Kerosene, 2 gallons ; whale oil soap, or common hard soap,^ 

 pound ; water, I gallon. Dissolve the soap in hot water. 

 Add the soap solution very hot to the kerosene ami chm-u, 

 preferably with spray pump, at least five minutes. In use, 

 dilute the emulsion in the proportion of 1 gallon of emulsion 

 to 9 or LU gallons of cold water. Apply in fine spray. 

 The great difficulty experienced in reaching every part 

 of the tree renders it absolutely necessary that any Uquid 

 used should be applied in fine spray and with considerable 

 force. An ordinax-y garden syringe does not acc<jm})!ish 

 this and can never be used satisfactorily against scale in- 

 sects. A force or spray pump will throw a constant stream 

 of moderately fine spray with such force that the fluid is 

 driven into close contact with the bark, and on striking the 

 leaves and branches is dashed into fine mist, which envel- 

 opes the tree and wets every leaf. The tree should always 

 be sprayed from each of the four sides, and rather more 

 liquid should be used than seems necessary to dicnch 

 every portion." — Uurtd (Jalifor-nian* 



The TAbLEST NnfiSERYaiAN IX THE United States is 



I stated by the American Gardtners' Montldy to be Mr. 

 Daniel Conger, of Walcotfc. New York, who stands 6 feet 



! inches. — Uardtnerg' Chronicle. 



Payable glucose sugar is made from '* old clothes " 



i in Germany. — Loi-d Houghton, a poet and Jamaica sugar- 

 planter, has purchased a large plantation, South Florida. 



j —S'n(/ar Planter. [It must be for a member of his 



I family, for Lord Houghton is an old man now and has 



I had a stroke of paralysis. — Ed.] 



I Cinchona Trees are now being culti^ted in the Gape 

 de Verde Islands, especially at St. Ant;iO and St. Thom6, 



I where, acconUug to I*rofessor Henriquez {Gard. Chronicle, 



j ilay 5, p. 5(i8;, there are aheady thousands of ijlants of C. 

 succintbi'a, ojficina/is and Ltdtfcriana, most of which have 

 been sent from the Botanic Garden at Coimbra. Analyses 

 of the bark of some of the trees have been made and with 

 most satis:'acror3^ results. This is interesting as the cinchona 



I cultivation seems to have been a failure at St. Helena. — 

 FharmaceiUical Journal, 



Tacant Laxd i.\ the , United States. — By the census 

 of 1880 the unsettled area of the United States amounted 

 to r,4()0,000 square miles, being nearly one-half of the 

 entire area of the country. The unsettled area east of the 

 Appalachian range of mountains has l>een reduced to 10,000 

 square miles only, and in the origuial thirteen states there 

 are less than 15,000 square miles imoccupied. AA'isconsin 

 and Michigan show 20,500 square miles as still unsettled, 

 while Tosas has no less than 137,000 square miles of vacant 

 land. In the territory west of the Mississipi, including 

 Minnesota. Dakota, Kdnsas, Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri, 

 Ai-kansas, New Mt^xico, Arizona, Coloi^ado, Montana, Idaho, 

 and the Pacific States, 1,200,000 square miles are either 

 unoccupied or inhabited only by Indians.— »F/e/</. 



IXDi.ARUEBER. — It docs not appear to be generally kno^vn 

 that indiarubber as now imported is a much more variable 

 article than formerly. This is due apparently to the fact . 

 that as the iudiarubber trees are destroyed near the coast 

 line or near the banks of navigable rivers, the natives have 

 to .search further finland and become less particulpr as to 

 the trees from which they take the milk. The juice of 

 different iuiharubber trees differs much in quality, as may 

 be easily dis.overed by adding various reagents to it. Tims 

 one kiad w.ll lie cmvlled by an acid, another by salt, another 

 by spirits of wine, an.! another by alum, and othtjrs again will 

 not curdle with either of these reagents. This depends upon 

 the body which cau-ies the suspension of the grains of rub- 

 ber in the form of miik, and which is sometimes ammonia, 

 sometimes a principle resembling saponine, and sometimes 

 a mucilaginous or albuminous body. Some rubbers contain 

 a good deal of resm. and others hardly any. These differ- 

 ences are generally discovered in manufacturing articles from 

 the rubber, and where the character of the rubber is altered 

 by the admi.xture of different kinds, or by the use of cliemi- 

 cals, it deteriorates iu value. This is the case with Para 

 rubber, which of late has been found very variable iu 

 the working, and in some samples crystals of alum have 

 been detected, showing that this substance has been used to 

 separate it from the imlk. It must be borne iu mind that 

 the milk of tat; tree in its natm-al state, simply dried by 

 exposure to the sun or by careful evapox-ation at a, 

 very gentle heat, yields, as a rule, a far better and more 

 lasting rubber than that which has had chemicals added to 

 it. For tiiis rea.son certain African and Borneo rubbers are 

 at present much esteemed by the manufacturer. The 

 great •liffereuce in the properties of rubber, some being 

 useful for one purpose and some for another, should lead to 

 careful collection of pure .s;unples for testing and valuation. 

 "VVhen onc<; the best rubbers for maufuacturiug purposes, 

 and at the same time for cultivation, have been asccertained, 

 there is no doubt that there will be a wide demand for rub- 

 ber of uniform quality, and th;it rnbber of Ihis character will 

 hold the market against all others. Much, however, has yet 

 to be done in the way of esperimeut. Sir John Rich has 

 thrown much light upon the rubbers of Eastern Africa and 

 similar work is much needed with regard to the rubbers of 

 Borneo, whieh as yet are only imperfectly known. The gutta- 

 percha pliints of the same island rei(uu-e investigation, and 

 any resident who will tuke the trouble to send home .sjiecimens 

 of the leaves, flowers, fruits and seeds of these trees and au- 

 thentic samples of the milky juice taken from them mil confer 

 a benefit both upon science and commerce. — Flantcrs^ Gazette. 



