70O 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[March i, 1883. 



portauce of dividing large areas of land in coffee 

 plantations by means of screen's or belts of trees which 

 would not so much break the force of the wind as filter 

 out from it the spores witli which it was laden." 

 Some of us attempted to establish such belts by means 

 of the rapid-growing Australian eucalj'pti, but anew 

 leaf-disease attacking them threatens to render our 

 efforts nugatory. To quote again from the report of 

 Mr. Home of Mauritius : — 



" We have got the Hemileia vasUUrix on nearly all 

 the coffee trees iu the island." 



Under the head "Fibres" the great success in the 

 growth of jute in the St.ite of Louisiana is recorded, 

 but it is indicated that the wliole question of success- 

 ful competition with India depends on tlie invention 

 of machinery which will counteract the advantage of 

 abundance of cheap labour. Confidence was felt that 

 such machinery would be invented. All experiments 

 to utilize the floss of the muddar plant {Ca/ati-ojjis 

 ghjanlea) have failed, nor is it indicated that any 

 economic use has been discovered for the guttapercha- 

 like substance which e.vudes from the stalks and of 

 the " poisonous " (blistering) effects of which the natives 

 here stand in great dread. It is the stalk fibre of this 

 plant which offers the greatest prospect of being ad- 

 vantageously utilized, unless the blistering milky juice, 

 resembling iu appearance and quality the juice of the 

 euphorliia known as the "milk hedge plant, " should 

 pi-ove an insuperable objoctiou, whicli we cannot think. 

 Amongst "food products " the coquito pahn of Chile 

 is noticed, but it does not promise to be any great 

 acquisition. There is a communication from Dr. Ni- 

 cholls of Dominica on " Creole spinach," which is 

 simply what is so well known in Ceylon, the leaves 

 of Amarantus trisiis. The leaves are usually called 

 " greens " in Ceylon. There is another and far better 

 form of " spinach " here, in a climbing plant with 

 fleshy ivy-like leaves. The normal colour is green, 

 but there is a purple variety. The plant grows readily 

 from seeds or cuttings, and ought to be more largely 

 cultivated and used than it is. There seems to be 

 no end to substitutes for coffee. We quote as follows : — 



" Nerjro Coffee. — In the ICew report for 1S77 (pps 

 39-40) I gave some particulars of the use of the seed' 

 of Ciissia ocddentalis in tropical Africa as a C'flee 

 substitute. These seeds occasionally find their way 

 iutu tlie European market. The following extract 

 from a letter from Dr. Nioholls of Dominica, dated 

 September 27th, 1881, shows that their use is well 

 known amongst the negro inhabitants of that island : — 



'Cassia occidentalis is, I find, an excellent coffee 

 substitute. It is called in Dominica by the ioUowing 

 names ' I'herbe puante,' 'cafe marrou, ' and ' \\i\A 

 coffee.' I have often heard of the negroes using the 

 seeds of a native plant as cottee, but it is only lately 

 that I have enquired into the eubjeel, witli results 

 that will 1 believe be of interest to you. 



' I collected some seeds and directed my conk to 

 roast and grind them, so that I might taete the 

 coS'i.'e.' Other matters engaging my attention I 

 orgot the circumstance until several days afterwards, 

 whc-u one evening my wife enquired how 1 liked my 

 after-dinner cup of coffee. I turned to her enquir- 

 ingly, when she laughingly said ' that is your -wild 

 coffee.' I was indeed surprized, for the coffee was 

 indistinguishable from that made of the best Arabian 

 beans, and we in Dominica are celebrated for our 

 good coffee. Aiterwarda some of the seeds roasted 

 and ground were brought to me, and the aroma was 

 eiiual to that of the ooHee ordinarily used in the island. 



' I intend to send you ii good quantity of the ' caf6 

 marroii' in its stages of preiiaration, in order that 

 you may h;ive im opportunity of undergoing my ex- 

 perience, and afterwards, you will, I think, be will- 

 ing to raise Cassia occidiiitnlis above the rank of a 



weed. I may inform yon that the plant itself is 

 used by the native ' doctors' medicinally in the form 

 of a decoction, and it has the reputation of being 

 a good diaphoretic. I will enquire into the matter, 

 experiment physiologically myself, and report the 

 result to you. The weed is very common, indeed 

 troubiesome to the sugar planters, so if it turns out 

 to be valuable it can be obtained in large quantities." 

 If this plant turns out to have all the qualities of 

 colfee wiiile resisting the coffee fungus, it may be 

 worthy of attention m Ceylon. But the diaphoretic quali- 

 ties attributed to it have an ominous flavour of chicory. 



There is a good deal about a sorghum called " rice 

 corn " ^^'hich is scarcely of interest here, and we can 

 take only an abstract interest in the discovery of a 

 vegetable substitute for rennet iu India. Cheese made 

 with this substance the natives will not object to eat, 

 so that in regard to it they can appropriately say 

 " That 's the cheese." The \'egetable rennet is prepared 

 from the seeds of Pimeeria coar/ulans, a non-poisonous 

 member of the tribe of Solanea;. Under the heading 

 "(Guttapercha" there is a very large amount of in- 

 formation, and as some of the trees producing this 

 valuable gum are indigenous to Ceylon, we scarcely 

 understand how guttapercha-producing trees are here 

 so entirely neglected in favour of the indiarubbers. 

 We suppose the main reason is that the gutt.aperoha- 

 yielduig trees take so much longer in reaching maturity. 

 Sir Joseph Hooker states : — 



''Unlike caoutchouc which is derived from plants of 

 groups belonging to wiilel.v different parts of the veget- 

 able kingdom, typical guttapercha appears to be 

 only yiflded by memliers of the Sapotaceis." 

 Dr. Trimeu is quoted to shew that plants from seeds 

 obtained from Mr. Low, Resident of Perak, are grow- 

 ing \'igorously at Peradeniya and Henaratgoda. The 

 Perak tree attains a height of 120 feet, but is said 

 to be quick-growing. Dr. Trimen believes it to be a 

 species of Payejia. The number of treesin all parts 

 of the world from which guttapercha or a substance 

 resembling it is obtained seems endless ; and many 

 climbing plants in the China and Malayan archi- 

 pelagoes are noticed as sources of iudiarubber. — Under 

 "medicinal plants" we have notices of the cultivation 

 of jalap iind other substances. Under " oil stuffs " 

 there is nothing of impoi-tance to ns in Ceylon. A 

 notice of the Phylloxera Congi-ess at Bordeaux is to us 

 another reminder of matter " crowded out," in the 

 shape of a very able paper by a brother of the Pera- 

 deniya Director, Mr. Rokaud Trimen, F. L. S., F. Z. S., 

 Director of the South African Museum. The history 

 of phylloxera and the vine too painfully resembles our 

 own ease with hemileia. In each case destruction of valu- 

 able property goes on, and all human effort at remedy is 

 apparently hopeless. The plantain is so largely grown 

 iu Ceylon that the utilization of the stalks for fibre 

 suitable for paper-making seems to be feasible. "We 

 quote as follows : — 



"Plaiitaiu-stems for papermaking, — Some inquiry has 

 been made as the utilisation of plantnin-fibre for paper- 

 making. As to its suitabdity, if procurable, there 

 can be no manner of doubt, as there was at one time 

 a keen demand from America for old Manilla rope 

 for the purpose. The paper made from this material, 

 of which there are specimens in the Kew Museum, 

 is of quite exceptional toughness. From time to time 

 plantain-stems have been supplied to paper-makers 

 from the Royal Gardens for experimental purposes. 

 The only drawback to the collection of the fibre iu 

 plantain-growing countries is the practical difficulty 

 of dealing with the 90 per cent, of water which the 

 steins contain. In India it is found that by opening 

 out the stems they can be dried in the sun iu about 

 a fortnight, but the fibre becomes discoloured and 

 otherwise deteriorated in the process. Mr. G. W. 



