IN THE CINCHONA FORESTS 273 



trees being cut down and the roots dug out, the bark is stripped 

 off much in the same way as oak bark in England, but no other 

 tool than the machete is used. . . . For drying the bark a stage 

 3 feet high is erected, called a tendal. Care must be taken 

 that the flame from the fire beneath the tendal does not reach 

 the bark, and if rain be apprehended the whole has to be roofed 

 over. When the bark is perfectly dry, they have only to convey 

 it to the depot at Camaron and receive their twenty dollars per 

 quintal, which is the price usually paid them by Messrs. Cordovez 

 and Neyra ; or rather, they have generally received the value in 

 advance, according to the custom of the country. 



In the valleys of the Chasuan and Limon I saw about 200 

 trees of Red Bark standing. Out of the whole number, only two 

 or three were saplings which had not been disturbed ; all the rest 

 grew from old stools, whose circumference averaged from 4 to 5 

 feet. I was unable to find a single young plant under the trees, 

 although many of the latter bore signs of having flowered in 

 previous years. This was explained by the flowering trees grow- 

 ing uniformly in open places, either in cane-fields which had been 

 frequently weeded or in pastures where cattle had grazed and 

 trodden about. The young plants, which I had been assured I 

 should find abundantly, proved to be either stolons or seedlings 

 (very few of the latter) of the worthless Cinchona magnifolia, 

 which grows plentifully at Limon, and must have fruited during 

 the rainy season, as the capsules were all burst open when I 

 arrived there. 



Cinchona siiccintbra is a very handsome tree, and, in looking 

 out over the forest, I could never see any other tree at all com- 

 parable to it for beauty. Across the narrow glen below our hut, 

 and at nearly the same altitude, there was a large old stool from 

 which sprang several shoots, only one of which rose to a tree, 

 while the rest formed a bush at its base. This tree was 50 feet 

 high, branched from about one-third of its height, and the coma 

 formed a symmetrical though elongated paraboloid. It lud 

 never flowered, but was so densely leafy that not a branch could 

 be seen ; and the large, broadly oval, deep green and shining 

 leaves, mixed with decaying ones of a blood-red colour, gave the 

 tree a most striking appearance. C. inagnifolia, called here 

 Cascarillo macho (male bark), grows rapidly to be a large tree. 

 I saw one which must have been over 80 feet high, and I cut 

 down a young tree which measured 60 feet. Saplings of 15 to 20 

 feet have a very noble appearance, from the large heart-shaped 

 leaves, little short of a yard long; but in full -ro\vn trees the 

 ramification is so sparse and irregular, and the leaves are so much 

 mutilated by caterpillars, that all beauty is lost. This species 

 sends out stolons from the root, which sometimes form a matted 



VOL. II T 



