BRASSICA 



Gujarat Rape 



MUSTAKD AND EAPE 



Various 

 Qualities. 



Presence of the 

 Essential Oil. 



Chemistry. 



Trade. 



Acreage 

 Subject to 

 Fluctuations. 



Production. 



richer in fatty matter and albuminoids. That information was derived 

 from a paper by Dr. Wittmack of Berlin. But the presence of a percentage 

 of the essential oil of mustard in rape-cake has been said to render such 

 injurious to cattle. Eoxburgh regarded Indian mustard-oil (fatty oil) as 

 inferior to rape-oil. Duthie and Fuller hold the same opinion. Speaking 

 of mustard-oil, they say it is less esteemed as an article of food than that 

 of rape. Most other writers affirm, however, that although the yield from 

 mustard is less, the quality of the oil is superior to that of either rape or 

 sarson. Thus it seems probable that the qualities of rape and mustard vary 

 considerably. Sarson is, as a rule, spoken of as an oil that rapidly turns 

 rancid and even for burning purposes has to be purified before it can be 

 used. The mustard-oil of the bazars of India has a pungent odour and 

 bitter taste, due to the presence of a certain amount of the essential oil. 

 This is occasioned through the habit of watering the cake before pressing it 

 a second time in order to abstract the residuary oil. It is often largely 

 adulterated with poppy-seed and other oils. Dunstan in his paper on 

 Indian Edible Oils (Agri. Ledg., 1899, No. 12) unfortunately affords no 

 information on the comparative values of the Indian mustards and rapes. 

 He furnishes, however, most useful particulars as to their specific gravity, 

 acid value, saponification, viscosity, etc., etc., and classes them as semi- 

 drying oils. Leather in a paper on Food-Grains and Fodders of India 

 (Agri. Ledg., 1903, No. 7) gives further details of the chemical composi- 

 tions of these oils. Lastly the Pharmacographia Indica furnishes all 

 necessary information on the medicinal merits of four qualities. These 

 appear to be Indian mustard, rape, sarson and jnmba (Etnica sativa). 



The adulteration of linseed with certain qualities of mustard or rape seed 

 has been reported to prove very injurious to cattle fed on such cakes. This 

 subject has been dealt with very fully in the Dictionary, and the article 

 in that work on Oils and Oilcakes should therefore be consulted. [Cf. 

 Leather, Agri. Ledg., 1897, No. 8, 158 ; also see Linum, p. 731, and Manures, 

 p. 770.] 



PRODUCTION OF AND TRADE IN MUSTARD AND RAPE. 



Acreage. It has been shown that owing to many of the crops 

 indicated above being grown in conjunction with other plants, it is 

 difficult if not impossible, in our present state of knowledge, to give 

 any very satisfactory statement of the area that they annually occupy. 

 The suggestion has been hazarded that the total (expressed as pure 

 crops) cannot be far short of 5 or 6 million acres. But according to 

 the Agricultural Statistics published by the Government of India, both 

 the area and the yield vary considerably, especially in the Panjab, 

 Kajputana and Sind, in response to the amount and seasonableness 

 of the rains. For example, the Panjab acreage of these crops, returned 

 in the official statistics of area and yield, was in 1899-1900, 397.500 ; in 

 the following year, 1,638,400 ; in the next year, 665,800 ; and again in 

 1903-4, 1,038,900, since when it has remained fairly stationary. 



Yield. Turning now to the estimated production, it would seem that 

 during the ten years ending 1901 there were two periods of abnormal 

 yield, namely 1897-8 and 1900-1. If these be disregarded, the traffic 

 fluctuated from a little over half a million to close on one million tons of 

 seed, during the decade mentioned, and production has shown on the whole 

 a tendency to expand. This view is in strict accord with the constantly 



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