770 ORD. XLVI. Liliacee. ALOE PERFOLIATA SOCOTORINA. 
iron or copper, are placed to one fire, though some have but two, 
and the small planters only one. The boilers are filled with juice, 
and as it ripens or becomes more inspissated, by a constant but 
regular fire, it is ladled forward from boiler to boiler, and fresh 
juice is added to that farthest from the fire, till the juice in that 
nearest to the fire (by much the smallest of the three, and com- 
monly called by the name of tatch, as in the manufactory of sugar) 
becomes of a proper consistency to be skipped or ladled out into 
gourds, or other small vessels, used for its final reception. The 
proper time to skip or ladle it out of the tatch, is when it is 
arrived at what is termed a resin height, or when it cuts freely, or 
in thin flakes from the edges of a small wooden slice, that is dipped 
from time to time into the tatch for that purpose. . A little lime- 
water is used by some aloe boilers during the process, when the 
ebullition is too great.” He adds, “ as to the sun-dried aloes 
which is most approved for medicinal purposes, very little is made 
in Bar ever very simple, though ex- 
tremely tediqus. The raw juice is either put into. bladders, left 
quite open at the top, and suspended in the sun, or in broad 
shallow trays of wood, pewter, or tin, exposed ako to the sun 
every dry day, until all the fluid parts are exhaled, and a perfect 
resin formed, which is then packed up for use, or for exportation.’’* 
These accounts of procuring the aloes differ considerably from 
that given by Dr. Wright, who says “ Hepatic aloes is obtained in 
the following manner. The plant is pulled up by the roots and 
carefully cleansed from earth or other impurities. It is then sliced 
and cut in pieces into small hand-baskets or nets, These nets or 
baskets are put into large iron boilers with water, and boiled for 
ten minuets, when they are taken out, and fresh parcels supplied 
till the liquor is strong and black. At this period the liquor is 
thrown through a strainer into a deep vat, narrow at bottom, to 
cool, and to deposit its faculent parts. Next day the clear liquor 
is drawn off by a cock, and again committed to the large iron 
* Millington, 1, c. 
