buei ;, m64 fUU I^HOPICAL AOtMCtJlfmHf^ 



5% 



VANILLA. 



A ladj'-writel? says i — But the most precious crop 

 here (South Sea Islands) is vanilla, which is both 

 pretty and lucrative, being worth about four dillars 

 a pouud. It is a luxuriant creeper, and grows so 

 freely that a branch broken off and falling on the 

 ground takes root of its own accord, and it climbs 

 all over the tall coffee shrubs, the palms, avocado, 

 pears, and orange trees, and everything that comes in 

 its way, growing best on living wood, the tendrils thence 

 deriving sustenance. It aJso flourishes best in unweeded 

 ^grounds, the roots being thereby kept cool, 60 the steep 

 wooded hill-side is densely matted with this fragrant 

 TSf ice, which scents the whole air; indeed, the atmos- 

 (jhere of the house is redolent of vinilla. It is like living 

 in a spice box, as the pods are laid to dry in every avail- 

 able corner. They must be gathered unripe and dried in 

 a moist warm place. Sometimes they are packed 

 under layers of quilts to prevent them from bursting, 

 and so lose their fragrant essence. AH this sounds 

 very pleasant, and only suggests light work. Yet in 

 truth this cultivation involves moit exhausting toil. 

 The plant is an exotic ; it lives in these isles by 

 the will of the planter not by nature's law. In its 

 . native home exquisite humming birds hover over its 

 blossoms therein darting their long bills in search of 

 honey, and drawing them forth clogged with the 

 golden pollen which they carry to the next flower, 

 thus doing nature's work of fertilisation. Here the 

 flowers have no such dainty wooers, and the vanilla 

 bears no fruit unless fertilised by human hands. So 

 M. and Madam Valles and their sou divide the steep 

 hill side into three sections, and each morning thej- 

 patiently but wearily toil up and down, up and down 

 again, again, and again in order to manipulate each 

 blossom thiit has expanded during the night. " Faire 

 le mariage des fleurs " as Madame ^^alle describes 

 lier daily task, is no sinecure ; it must be done during 

 ■the hottest hours of the day when any exertion is 

 most exhausting. It needs a keen eye to detect 

 ■eajh fresh blossom, and any neglected flower withers 

 or drops. Each day the ripened pods must be gathered, 

 and in dry weather the plants require frequ'^.nt water- 

 ing and indescribable toil.— P/(?iucr and Fanner. 



NEW DEVELOPMENT OF THE WATTLE 



INDUSTBY. 



Messrs. Fajrrow &'H.\yceoit have established at 

 Echunga, Sjuth Australia, a manufactory of tanage, 

 which must be of great interest to all colonists, and 

 from the m-thods employed is almost pharmaceutical. 

 About lO.OOit tons of wattle bark are sent annuiUy 

 from Souili Australia alone, and it is calculated that 

 the waste in stripping is about four times this amount. 

 The new factory converts the branches too small 

 to pay for stripping into a strong fluid extract 

 called tawir/e, which contains water 60 per cent, 

 soluble tannin 33-2 per cent, according to an analysis 

 by Mr. G. H. Hodgson of samplei from the first 

 80 tons recently shipped to England. The wattle 

 "trash" yields 12 to 16 per cent of tanige ; two 

 men can often cut and load 3 tjns, and the waggons 

 can bring in two loads a day, equal to 5 or 6 tons ; 

 and, at the price (1/. a tou) which the flrzn is 

 paying for thinnings and tops and branches, so much 

 is offering that the patentees are obliged to distribute 

 their orders. The " tra,^h " is tied up in large bundle.'; 

 fiiid carted in to the factory. It is there weighed, 

 close besides the machine which cuts it up into 

 " chaff." This machine is very much like an ordinary 

 Steam-plane, the chisels revolving at a high speed, 

 and cutting through 2A-iuch saplings quite readily. 

 The chips are shovelled into large wooden hoppers, 

 into which steam is introduced from a large Cornish 

 boiler. _ There are three steam-heated vats, and the 

 liquor is transferred from one to the other, pumped 

 into elevated tanks, and thence allowed to tl.nv from 

 a tap on to steam-heated evaporating pans about 30 

 or 40 feet in length. The evaporation is so rapid 

 Miat in traversing the paos from one cud to the otber 



4y 



the liquid is converted into a thick, tenacious, trei- 

 cly extract. At the end of the pans it flaws into 

 a cistern, and thence by a kind of treacle-gate iu'.d 

 the casks, each of which will hold about 10 cwt. All 

 that now remains to be done is paste on a label, 

 put in a bung, weigh the cask, and send it off to 

 market. In the process of evaporation a certain 

 portion of the tannic acid is destroyed. The '• plant " 

 can be easily remove 1 from place to place. It does not 

 pay to cart the " trash " far, but a ftw sijiiare miles of 

 wattle country will keep a factory going. The utili- 

 sation of thiiiniugs allows the cultivation of the tree 

 thickly on waste ground, and to begin cutting the 

 third year. European tanners are quite accustomed 

 to the use of such extracts, but it is said that it 

 will be very hard to introduce it into colonial 

 tanneries. The Cbi.f Secretary (Hon. David Murray) 

 and others were invited to make a visit of in pection 

 on July 17, and .>^eemed to have been highly grati- 

 fied. "While on this subject we may mention that 

 Messrs. \y. Mofflin & Co. have sent the Ho}i.th Ai'str<i- 

 lirni Il"ijUter a letter enclosing a cutting from a 

 perio lical called Leather, published in London, which 

 seriously reflects on the credit of the Melbourne 

 merchants, and it is likely to injure the btrk trade. 

 Ticii'lter states th^t a large proportion of the ground 

 bark sold there as best Melbourne ground mimosa 

 bark never grew on the continent of Australia, but 

 in Tasmania, where the tree is plentiful, but the 1. irk 

 very iuferi )r. Its value on the market at ^Melbourne 

 is about 4/. per ton in the rind. " The superior 

 quality of the bark grown in Melbourne and Adelaide 

 has created a large and increasing demand for it 

 on the Lindon marke\ The shipments from Ade- 

 laide and Melbourne since January 14» have amounted 

 to 3,874 tons. This is a large quantit}', considerably 

 more than the two districts can produce, so that it 

 IS certain that there his been a large ad nixture of 

 inferior bark from the Tasmauian forests. Our corres- 

 pondent informs us that the value of this second- 

 rate bark in Melbourne is 41. per ton ; cost of grind- 

 ing, lO.f, do.; bigging, lO.v. ; freight, H. 10s. do. —0/. 

 lO.v. The best ground bark realises in London from 10^. 

 to 12^. so that it w 11 be seen it is a very lucrative 

 business, and likely to continue so if the English 

 buyers have no means of detecting the fraud."— CVu-./iisi 

 and Dreggist. 



THE CULTIVATION OF CELERY AND 

 STRA^VBERKIES. 



The close of the rains being the -seed time for 

 European vegetables, millis are (or should be) very 

 busy at the present season ; and the following practi- 

 cal hmtson the cultivation of celery one of the most 

 highly prized of our home vegetables may prove oppor- 

 tune, especially as celery so often fails under the 

 treatment of the native gardener. The seed imported 

 should bo sown in boxes of rich, li^'ht soil; it should 

 be sown very thinly, and the best way to effect this 

 is to mix a pinch of the seed with a little dry sai d 

 or earth, and then sprink'e it evenly over, the sur- 

 face of the soil which should first be presse 1 down 

 smoothly and somewhat tirniiy, by means of a flat 

 board. After scattering the seed, cover it thinly with 

 a little light soil and give a moderate watering. The 

 boxes should bo placed where they get plenty of light 

 but no suu and the soil should be kept of Uniform 

 moisture. If the seed conies Up very thick, thin out; 

 the weaker looking seedlings. AX'heu the seedlings 

 show three leaves they must be planted out into a 

 raised bed in the garden, to make which proceed As 

 follows : — Select an open place on hard soil for tliG 

 nursery and rise on it a bed four inc'jes high of the 

 richest thoroughly deciyeil stable litter or cov's manure 

 a mixture of both is preferable. Press it down pretty 

 firmly, and then transplant the seedlings on to it four 

 inches apart. The plants should be shaded in tho 

 midday liy means of a piece of matting suspended 

 on sticks over the bed ; the watering should be liberal 

 both morning and evening. 



» Tjo What date is not stated, "~ 



