592 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[January i, 1883. 



Palermo "bitters" are really better adapted; and it 

 may n"t be generally known that the best marmalade 

 of all is produced from the shaddock, a sort of cross 

 between an orange and a lemon, and named after a 

 Captain Shaddock, who brought it from China, or, as 

 some eay, from Guinea, and planted it in the West 

 Indies, whence we derive our limited supply. It is the 

 bitter element in the Seville and Palermo oranges which 

 tits them tor marmalade, as it preserves the skins while 

 they dry ; and we need not be very much alarmed at 

 the stori'S we are told of orange peel being collected in 

 the streets and at places of entertainment for marmalade 

 purposes, as the skins of ordinary oranges instead of 

 drying simply become rotten. The head-quarters of 

 thejorange trade is Pudding Lane, Lower Thames Street, 

 where during the season the chief brokers hold sales 

 three or four times a week. Pudding Lane, where tlie 

 Greiit Fire of London ia said to have begun, is not 

 exactly an oranye grove, but during the height of the 

 oranue season it is about as busy a spit as any in the 

 City, and if an unwary passenger happens to get in the 

 way of the "fellowship" porters carrying along it all 

 day long the orange packages he is not unlikely to be- 

 come the object of some Billingsgate vernacular. A 

 large quantity of the fruit sold in Pudding Lane after- 

 wards tinds its way to Duke's Place, a quarter of the 

 Hebrew r-^^ion of Houndsditch, where it is resold to 

 shopkeepers and costermongers. This locality is redolent 

 of oranges, and it is no exaggeration to say that you 

 may often walk for yards there ankle deep in decaying 

 orange pulp and peel. The appetite for oranges among 

 "the masses" in London seems almost insatiable, and 

 it is said that nearly half of the retail trade in them is 

 done by the itinerant street vendors. A package of 

 oranges contains on an average four hundred. In the 

 season IS81 82 nearly a million packages were landed 

 in London, and not far short of that number in Liver- 

 pool. Glasgow receives a large, and each year an iur 

 creasing, number, while Bristol and Hull account fot 

 many thousands. Altogether it has been computed tha- 

 last season two and a half million packages were im- 

 ported into this country, which would represent some- 

 thing like one thousand million of oranges for home 

 consumption. Happily the orange is a verj harmles-!, if 

 not a decidedly wholesome, fruit. — Morning Post. 



MALAY PLANT LORE. 



(From the Stralls Times.) 



Under the heading of Oriental Plant Lore, the follow- 

 ing interesting contribution to our knowledge of the 

 Plant lore appears in the Hongkong Daily Press of the 

 18th November. We feel sure there are many of our 

 readers who could supplement it largely, and we invite 

 them to do so : — 



Everywhere in the East we come across the belief 

 that woods, groves, and trees are presided over or 

 possessed by spirits. Hunter notices this among the 

 Santals (" Annals of Rural Bengal," p. 184), and Logan 

 says ("Journal of the Indian Archipelago," I., 309 

 seq.) {" The Hantu Kayu (wood demon) frequents every 

 species of tree, and afflicts men with diseases. Some 

 trees are noted for the malignity of their demons." 

 Hence we find everywhere sacred trees and groves, and 

 as early as the times of the Pentateuch we read of the 

 same kind of things, while the ancient Greeks had their 

 sacred groves and plants. In the charms and invoca- 

 tions of the Malays we find continual reference to the 

 finploymeut of leaves, branches, and flowers for the 

 accomplishment of evil ends. There ia a plant which is 

 supposed to produce feelings of hatred, and is on this 

 account called the Hate-plant, In an invocation to 

 excite hatred we find the words: — "Shoots of the 

 Hate. plant! Leaves of the Hate-plant! I pluck seven 

 shoots, seven leaves ; I cut them seven times, and so 

 cut ti e. heart of such an one (naming the person)." And 



again : — " Shoots of Beruwang intermix with the leaves 

 of the Hate-plant," &o. (Compare Gubernati's Mytho- 

 logie des Plantes," I.. 127, 278, S. V. "Envie"). In 

 some invocations the betel-nut is introduced, and in an 

 invocation for abusing we read : — 



Silusa Padang silasa I 



Throw a sula^^tieti branch ! 



May the heart that is angry be shut ! 



As elsewhere, so among the Malays we find a belief 

 in the delight of evil spirits to torment women in 

 labour. One of their evil beings is called PeningaUs, 

 who was once a woman possecsing Satanic powers. 

 She longed to be able to fly, and part of her being went 

 about, while the other pait remained where it was. 

 She was a regular vampire, and the people whose blood 

 she sucked died. If blood from her fell on any, tliey 

 were taken ill and died. She delighted especially in 

 sucking the blood of women in childbirth. For this 

 reason it was the custom, when a child was born in a 

 house, to lay down jaruye leaves, or thorns, on the 

 tioor when the blood was falling, least the peningalan 

 should come to suck it. These leaves and thorns are 

 dreaded by the vampire, who fears they may become 

 entangled in that portion of her body (the entrails) 

 which alone goes from place to place. 8ee the work 

 quoted by Thompson in "Sequel to Glimpses of Life in 

 the Far East," p. 176. 



We scarcely find a single people which does not 

 possess a love for wild flowers, and delight in wearing 

 them as ornaments, either in their natural state, or 

 artificially produced. Speaking of the Dyaks of Borneo, 

 Marrvat says that he saw the 7ne>i with their hair 

 falling down their backs and nearly reaching their 

 middle, it being prevented from falling over the face by 

 a fillet of grass, which was ornamented with mountain 

 Aowers. This reminds us of the Malay derivations. 

 (See "Borneo and the Malay Archipelago," p. 11, aud 

 " The Hindoos," I., 19). The Malays call the Mussmnda 

 " the leaf of the princess," because their ladies are fond 

 of the grateful odour of its white leaves. Many people 

 transplant it from the woodi into their gardens, and 

 use it for a dial or clock, especially in cloudy weather. 

 In a new and interesting work called " I'Veaks and 

 Marvels of Plant Life," by Dr. Cooke, will be found 

 much information about these horological plants, and 

 I have also devoted a chapter to the subject in my 

 forthcoming Flower Lore. Among the Dyaks of Borneo 

 it is believed that the rice. plant has a spirit or soul (the 

 samangat padi), which corresponds to the kala of the 

 Karens (Gubernati's " Mythologic des Plantes," IT., p. 

 311 ; Forbes' " British Burmah," p. 273). Every one 

 has heard of, if he has not seen, the Casuarina tree. It 

 is found in Polynesia, and used as a funeral plant, just 

 as the cypress was among the Greeks, and as the 

 weeping willow still is by ouiselves. It always grows 

 in iVlalaya, and is known in Borneo as Kayu Aru. The 

 Malays have some legends of great interest connected 

 with this tree, and can rarely be persuaded to cut it 

 down, notwiths-tanding the fact that its tough timber is 

 very useful for a variety of purposes, the more so as it 

 is very light. lu the South Seas the tree is called Iron- 

 wood. i5ee "The Gardens of the Suu," pp. 99, 127, 

 275,270; "Outlines of Botany, " p. 523 ; Contemporary 

 Revieio, May, 1882; and "A .Mission to Viti," p. 16. 

 Tue author of the latter work writes thus: — "Not far 

 trom the church was the tomb of a departed chief, a 

 series of slabs placed perpendicularly and forming a 

 square filled up by mould, over which a kind of stied 

 was erected. A dense grove of iron-wood trees, so much 

 reminding us, by their sombre aspect, of our pines, 

 form an accompaniment to the place. The wind playing 

 in the branches, caused a wailing, melancholy sound, 

 fully impressing me with the idea that even the savages 

 who planted these trees must have had some sparks of 

 poetry in tiieir composition. It is a strange ethnolo- 

 gical fact that most natives surround the tombs of 



