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THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[March 2, 1885. 



for upwards of a year. Another method is to soak a quantity 

 of yellow Soy Beans in water for a uight, then boil them 

 in a large kettle, and as soon as the water in the kettle 

 has evaporated, and the beans show a reddish-yellow colour, 

 they are removed to a mortar and pouuded, after which 

 they are placed on mats. When they are thoroughly cooled 

 they are shaped into balls as large as hand-balls, cut with 

 a knife into flat pieces about an eighth of an inch thick, 

 and placed on mats shaped like scales of fish. As soon 

 as mould appears upon them they are taken, crushed into 

 small pieces, and exposed, to the rays of the sun for a 

 day or two. When nearly dry, salt and water are added 

 to them, and the whole is pounded in a mortar and then 

 left in a cask for a month or two, and sometimes longer, 

 when the preceding process will be repeated. Finally, if 

 it is sealed up in casks it will never deteriorate. It is 

 in prime condition when three years old. It forms one 

 of the most necessary articles of food in Japan, and has 

 been used from time immemorial, both by nobles and men 

 of inferior rank. It is made into a soup, and is one of 

 the courses served up as a principal article of everyday 

 diet. The mode of preparing the soup is to rub the miso 

 around an earthen bowl, into which a suitable quantity 

 of water has been poured. It is then filtered through a 

 sieve, and vegetables added according to taste; the whole 

 is then boiled and served up. Miso is also used to give 

 an agreeable flavour by mixing it with other food, and 

 it is likewise mixed with condiments, as Japanese 

 Pepper, Giuger, Horse-Eadish, Chillies, Sesame, Poppy 



Soy or Shoi/11, is perhaps the chief product of the Soy 

 Bean. It consists of a mixture of these Beans, Wheat, 

 salt, and water. The mode of preparing it is to thorough- 

 ly boil, after washing in a cask with water, fifty parts 

 of Beans, and to parch about fifty parts of Wheat in a 

 pan for a little while and thoroughly boil it, after grind- 

 ing on a stone mill : when these two substances are mixed 

 together and kept in a warm room for about four days, 

 the substances are converted into a yellow flour-like matter ; 

 this is yeast. This yeast is then thrown into a mixture of 

 salt and water, and afterwards thoroughly cooled, then boiled 

 in a large kettle, and stirred with a Bamboo instrument twice 

 a day in summer, and once a day in winter. After the 

 lapse of three years, the sediment is poured into a bag 

 then put into a small tub and submitted to strong pressure 

 by means of a bar at the end of which hangs a heavy 

 weight. The fluid expressed is poured into a kettle and 

 submitted to a heat of not more than 80°; it is again 

 removed to a large tub and set away for a night, when 

 it becomes a deep black colour, and acquires a very 

 delicious taste. Soy is one of the most valuable foods, 

 and is in daily use; mixed with several kinds of food it 

 imparts to them a delicious flavour. It is universally liked, 

 and is really indispensable in the Japanese kitchen. The 

 quantity annually consumed in Japau is extremely large, 

 aud of late years the article has been exported. — Gardeners' 

 Chronicle. 



Indiakubbeu in Guatemala. — AVe learn, from Mr. 

 Consul Bennett's report on the trade and commerce of 

 Guatemala during 1883, that the vexed question of 

 tapping the trees, or cutting them down, was under 

 discussion. What happened with the guttapercha trees 

 (Dichopsis uutta) in Singapore and Penang forty years 

 ago. by which the plants became well-nigh exterminated 

 in those islands, has since been enacted in other countries 

 with other useful plants. The Guatemala rubber tree 

 (CastiUoa elastica) is a valuable source of this important 

 substance, and should be carefully preserved. Consul 

 Bennett says those in favour of cutting down allege that 

 the quantity of rubber extracted by so doing is oiilj equal 

 to what would be collected in five or six tappings, after 

 which the tree would die, and consequently that the 

 yield, being immediate and of equal quantity witli what 

 would be given by a series of yearly tappings, and tin- 

 tree in both cases dying, it is more to the interest of 

 all to cut the tree down at once. This course, however. 

 is forbidden by a Government decree. It is possible the 

 law may be rescinded, and the practice allowed on con- 

 dition of two new rubber trees being planted for every- 

 one cut down.— Indiarubber and Guttapercha Journal. 



The yield of tea on Aberdeen estate is reported 

 by the Manager in another column to have been 

 for 1884 over 1,000 lb. per acre of made tea from 

 the 9 iicre^ rive years' old. In this connection we 

 see the old dishonest and untruthful game started 

 by our morning contemporary and a coi respondent of 

 referring to the Observer as inflating the Tea Enterprise 

 — the fact being that the only (and repeated) editorial 

 warnings have been given in our columns and that 

 the "Tillies" has been saying far more about "the 

 thousand pounds an acre." But so it was in respect 

 of "coffee": from 1872 onwards, we warned men to 

 buy or plant on the basis of 3 cwt. an acre and 80s 

 a cwt. (when the price_ was over 100s) and yet we 

 got the blame of the Cash Credit inflation which we 

 had expressly condemned ! 



Withes Bliuht on Tea is thus noticed in the proceedings 

 of the Agricultural aud Horticultural Society of India: — 

 Extracts of letter received from John Ramage, Esq., Manager, 

 Tingri Tea Co., Limited, — No. 650, dated liibrooyhur, 11th 

 December Ib'S.'/. I am sending you today by sample post, 

 shoots or branches from three blighted bushes, and trust thev 

 may reach in such order as to pay examination, each has its 

 history wrapped round it. Enclosure. — " Tea Planter's " re- 

 marks refer to this identical blight, but I told you in mine of 

 12th ultimo, what little effect cutting down had upon it. 

 On the first appearance of " blackened " leaves, I have 

 examined the bushes affecte 1 down branches, stem and 

 roots, and could find no trace at any time of the white 

 thread like parasite which afterwards appears, and which 

 I believe to be the outcome of the original attack of wither, 

 this opinion is open to consideration, as 1 note the parasite, 

 after showing does not run down the stem, but up the 

 shoots that are giving leaf, and displays a sort of frost 

 upon the leaves which die. The white thread runs to with- 

 in 10" or 12" of the ground aud to get rid of it by cut- 

 ting to that, wants some thinking over. My opinion is 

 that some atmospheric influence has to account for the 

 leaf getting black in the first instance, the bushes attacked 

 being ready to receive the same, just as a run of any 

 epidemic will select its victims promiscuously, aud the only 

 remedy I cm see, and it may be worth a trial, is to have 

 the bushes attacked stripped of every leaf on the first sign 

 of "sickness," so that if the parasite has been created it 

 may die from want of food. It is evident, it is not migrat- 

 ory, else why should it group so. With these remarks 

 I close on wither blight for the present. 



The African Oil-palm (Elais yuineends). — The Arclih 

 der Pha.rm.acie, October. 1S8J. contains a paper by A 

 Meyer. Pharmaceutical Docent at the University of 

 Strassburg, on the structure, habitat, uses, &c, of thr 

 African palm-tree (Elais yuineensis), from which it appears 

 that although this palm, which is the only one of im- 

 portance from a mercantile point of view, has now its 

 chief habitat in Africa, it must have originally come from 

 tropical America, where a similar but inferior palm {Elait 

 melanococcu) is still indigenous. That nearly all parts 

 of palms are of some value is well known, and this is 

 especially the case with Elais guineensis. The leaves are 

 used by the natives for roofing and wicker-work, the fibres 

 at the bottom of the petiole serve for textile fabrics or 

 caulking boats. From the juice a kind of wine is prepared, 

 and the fruit and seeds yield the palm oil of commerce 

 The oil, which is commercially the most important pro- 

 duct of the African palm, is obtained by crushing tin' 

 fruit and extracting the oil with boiling water, or hy 

 allowing the fruit to ferment, whereupon the seeds easily 

 separate, and the oil is melted out from the former, 

 This constitutes the crude oil, which is then handed over 

 to Europeans for refining, either in factories not far from 

 the source or in Europe. Palm oil and palm seeds are Im- 

 ported solely from Africa. The trade is in the hands 

 of native brokers, who bay the oil from the negroes in 

 exchange for good dust, strips of iron, brass, copper wire, 

 and the like. The centre of the palm-oil trade consists 

 of the oil villages Talifer, Fishtown, Snaketown. and 

 Bouny, on the shores of the River Bonny, the latter 

 village being the most important, the business done t Inn- 

 alone in oil aud seeds amounting to several thousand 

 tons a week. — Chemist and Druggist, 



