Deceember I, 1883.] 



THE TROPIC ALAGRICULTURIST- 



393. 



ill July last* The trees supplying these have been per- 

 maueiitly labelled with the same numbers as the barks 

 anrl specimens, so that they can be readily referred to at 

 any time. The" examination of Dr. Bidie's ooUeutiou led to 

 the foUowiu;; remark by Sir Jos. Hooker in his letter of 

 3rd August; "Crossing has evidently gone ou so extens- 

 ively that no one but a botanist accustomed to the fades 

 of living cinchona plants could pronounce an opinion upon 

 the mixture of forms with any authority or without the 

 risk of adding to the confusion of nomenclature." 



I now proceed to the observations I have to make 011 

 the botanical characteristics and names of the trees inspected 

 by me in the Nilgiri plantations. 



9. C. si(t'C(ra?'ra,Pav.— In regard to red bark, I can very 

 confidently' endorse the opinions expressed by all the botan- 

 ists who have examined the matter, that the well-known 

 tree which forms the bulk of Naduvatam is the true C. 

 siiccirubra, Pav. I have examined Pavon's own specimens 

 in the British Museum which precisely correspoud wth 

 the ordinary red bark of India, Ceylon and Jamaica. This 

 has the leaves generally more or less pubescent or pub- 

 erulent beneath, as is the case with Pavon's specimens ; 

 and Mr. Howard is mistaken in sayingt that the common 

 plant in India is perfectly smooth. Dr. Spruce's descrip- 

 tion at p. 101 of his octavo report of 1861 is very good. 

 I must, however, allow that 1 found svcciiuhra in Nadu- 

 vatam a more variable type as to the foliage than I am accus- 

 tomed to in Ceylon. Among the large trees in the original 

 plots are to be noticed, besides the ordinary kind with leaves 

 glabrous above and pubescent beneath, not a few which 

 have leaves at least when mature altogether smooth ; some 

 again are persistently hairy on both surfaces. There were 

 also a few trees with remarkably narrow leaves attenuated 

 at the base. As a rule, the leaves are less bullateand 

 smaller than in Ceylon, but it must be remembered that 

 Naduvatam is a somewhat higher elevation than this species 

 is usually grown at here. 1 have no doubt that some of 

 the leaves from the Naduvatam red bark would be called 

 " jmhefcens " in Ceylon, and I am also convinced that this 

 is partly due to many plants and seeds of this kind having 

 been actually sent out from the Naduvatam plantation under 

 the latter name. 



A few miserable and scarcely recognizable little trees 

 were all I saw of succiruhra on Dodabetta. 



10. C. Calisaya, Wedd.— I have little to say about the 

 plants included under this name represented in the Nil- 

 giris.J There are patches both on Dodabetta and Nadu- 

 vatam, but neither contain any well-grown trees. As may 

 be seen from the hst in paragraph 4, they are of various 

 origins. A plot on the east slope of Dodabetta low down 

 planted in 18tl5 (said to be from Mr. Jloney's seed) pre- 

 sents the extraordinary mixture of varieties that one is 

 accustomed to in seed from Java. The bulk are the varieties 

 known as " jarunica" and "vera" in Ceylon, but there 

 are also a few trees of succiruhra and micrantha and two 

 or three of what I am accustomed to consider a hybrid 

 between calisaya and officinalis and occasionally met with 

 in Ceylon plantations. Among them, too, the superintend- 

 ent, Narrainsawmy, pointed out two or three which he 

 said Mr. Moens, in his visit in 1880, had pronounced to be 

 C. Mt/eriaua, but these were not in flower, and I am not 

 able to distinguish this species with certainty from foliage 

 alone. 



At Naduvatam, as would be expected from its locahty, 

 the Calisaya varieties are rather better in growth, but even 

 here they are gradually dying out. Dr. Bidie selected no less 

 than fifteen sorts for his dried collection which exhibit a 



wide range in size and shape of leaf, size and colour of 

 flower and form of the seed-capsule. A large and broad- 

 leaved form is that which grows most vigorously. I saw 

 nothing Uke C. Ledyeriana among them. As might be ex- 

 pected, a fair number of the very broad-leaved large-flowered 

 hybrid with V. succiruhra, C. aiiyiica, How.,* were to be 

 seen in Naduvatam. 



11. C. ojjicratdis, L. (C. condaminea, Humb. & Bonpi. — 

 Dodabetta plantations are almost entirely composed of 

 this species which grows there to perfection ; there are 

 also a large number of Naduvatam. In common with other 

 botanists who have been recently over the plots I failed 

 to detect many marked varieties ; indeed what partic- 

 ularly struck me was the remarkable uniformity of type 

 prevailing throughout the vast expanse of the Dodabetta li- 

 no gi-eater variety was to be seen than in a plantation of 

 oaks, elms or poplars. If it be desued to distinguish by 

 names the diflierences in the width of the lea%-es it would 

 appear that the broadest represent C. uritusinya, Pav., 

 and theuarrowest the true €'. rns^Ki, Taf. ; the intermediate 

 ones being the vars. lionplandiana, How., and Jiiynstifolia, 

 Wedd. 1 am unable to sep.arate these, which completely 

 pass into one another, I had expected to find here some- 

 thing more distinctive as Uritusinya. Two varieties bear 

 the plantation name of " Anyustifoliu " and are distin- 

 guished as "No. 1 " and "No. 2"; the latter has by no 

 means a narrow leaf. One of these represents apparently 

 Mr. Broughton's plant (No. 10 of the list in paragraph 

 4.)I A vigorous propagation wasgoingonby seed of an- 

 other form, which was called " crisjia" by Mclvorand Bed- 

 dome, pn what grounds I am not aware. This form has 

 rather acuminate leaves and very large flowers, and is re- 

 markable for the development of a very thick corky outer 

 bark. I saw but one plant, but there are said to be seven 

 or eight in Dodabetta. I also detected two plants of 

 officiaalif: (both broad-leaved) distinctly pubescent beneath. 

 12. C. lancifolia, Mutis. — Though this has been in cult- 

 ivation from the very commencement of the plantations, 

 very little has been heard of it ; and recently it has quite 

 dropped out of notice, being no longer included in the an- 

 nual lists. The few existing trees are the survivors of 

 the numerous descendants of a single plant which was 

 alone saved out of six brought from Java in 1861. The two 

 or three that I saw were in the lower part of Dodabetta 

 near the Jalap C4arden. I was at first inclined to treat 

 them as another form of officinalis, but a closer examin- 

 ation has since shown me" their distinctness, if not as a 

 species at least as a well-marked variety. The habit and 

 leaves are certainly very like an ordinary ojidtialis, but 

 the calyx shows a marked contraction above the 

 tube, and its free part is sub-campanulate and spreading 

 with rather large triangular segments ; the disk is very 

 thick and prominent, and the corolla large, dark lake and 

 with a broad tube ; the large calyx is persistent and crowns 

 the oblong-ovoid capsule. The different calyx seems to 

 separate it from all forms of officinalis^ A figure, re- 

 duced from the magnificent plate of Karsteu's Columbian 

 Flora, will be found in Markham's " Cinchona Species of 

 New Granada," page 53, where is also reprinted a full 

 description. The cultivation of this species is maintained 

 in the Java Government plantations. 



13. C. micrantlia.ll.kV. and iisalliis, — The (irey Barks 

 require no particular notice here. However important a place 

 they may have once occupied in theplantation3,theyareuow 



* The dried specimens have been transfen-ed to the herba- 

 rium here at Peradeniya. Dr. Bidie has since prepared and 

 tr.'insmitted to the Pharmaceutical Society's Museum in 

 London a still larger series, but with the same nomen- 

 clature. 



t Pharmaceutical Journal, October 1881. Nor do I think 

 he is correct in stating that bark of " Pata," of " pubes- 

 cens," or of " Cuchicara," is sent home from India or 

 Ceylon under the name of " red bark " ; though, no doubt, 

 succiruhra bark may have been sent as "hybrid pubes- 

 ceus." 



t I notice that in the most recent enumeration of the 

 trees ( ;ilst March 1882) no estimate of the number of raii- 

 laya is attimpted, the space being loft blank. 



* ^Ye]l figured by Howard in his " Quinology," t. 10. 

 He raised it from seed sent from the Nilgiris by Mr. 

 Broughton and taken from an ordinary calisaya which had 

 doubtless been crossed by neighbom-ing succiruhra. 



■f Jlclvor in 1869 says (Report, para. 9) that from the three 

 original kinds of crown bark, at least seven distinct varieties 

 had been raised. He is said afterwards to have distin- 

 guished as many as twenty-two sorts. Mr. Broughton 

 mentions as many as twenty. 



I It appears, however, that Broughton's original tree 

 is no longer in existence. 



§ True V. Chahuaryuera, K. & V. (not of Howard, which 

 is merely narrow-leaved officinalis), is closely allied or in- 

 termediate ; and C. macrocalyx. Pav. (as figured in Wedd.,' 

 Hist. Quiuq. t. bis., fig. A) must also be very near C, 

 lanci/olia. 



