CHINCHON A CULTIVATION IN INDIA. 45 
dense: shade, as our present experience has shown that under such cons 
ditions Chinchona plants cannot flourish. The main cause of this is, 
that the ‘roots’ of the forest trees immediately fill up the holes into 
which the Chinchona plants are placed, thus depriving them of nourish- 
ment at the roots, while they are choked above for want of light. 
The production of alkaloids also cannot take place until the Chinchona 
plants have overtopped the forest trees, and expanded their heads to the 
open sunshine to enable them perfectly to elaborate their juices ; and as 
this: will require a’ period of forty to sixty years, and the necessity to 
destroy the plantation to obtain the produce even after this lapse of 
time, this system, I fear, cannot be considered as one at all desirable 
to follow. 
-oé Tn the early part of last season several plants of different species of 
Chinchona were planted out under different conditions, in order to test 
experimentally which would be the safest system of cultivation to pur- 
sue. These plants have been carefully watched and treated in every 
respect alike, and the result. has been that the plants placed without 
the protection of living shade have made the most satisfactory progress. 
1 ©The plants placed under living shade were found to be damaged in 
some degree by the incessant drip; however, on the weather clearing 
up, they threw out fresh leaves and quickly recovered, but towards the 
‘end of the dry season these plants were found to be suffering consider- 
ably from the drought. On taking a few of them up, it was found 
that the holes in which they had been placed had. become filled by the 
fibres of the roots of the forest-trees in the neighbourhood, which had 
drawn up the whole of the moisture and nourishment from the soil. in 
Which they were planted. | 
“Phe average growth of the plants under shade, from the end of May 
‘tothe 14th of May, 1862, has been about 3 inches. | 
“Tn putting out the plants which were placed in the open, without 
‘any living shade whatever, we saw from the first that we had. to com- 
‘bat; with the young plants, the bad effects of excessive evaporation 
‘during our dry season under a bright and scorching sun; we also saw 
‘the injury likely to be done to the plants by excessive radiation during 
bright and cloudless nights. To obviate these disadvantages, the plants 
"Nete:sheltered on the approach of the dry weather by a rough enclosure 
“of bamboo branches, with the leaves adhering to them, so as to give 
. the plants sufficient shelter, both from the effects of cvaporation and ra- 
