184 GAMBIR. 



cess of manufacturing that extract, from the 

 collecting of the prunings, the stripping of the 

 leaves, to the completion. The shrubs were 

 from five to seven feet high, with rather drooping 

 branches ; the time of collecting, is when the 

 shrubs require pruning, which is usually every 

 six months ; and the trees would be injured, if 

 not destroyed in value, were they not regularly 

 pruned. It is stated, that one shrub will exist 

 and produce the extract for twenty-five or thirty 

 years, if properly and regularly attended to : 

 every care is taken to keep the plantations free 

 from weeds. 



I have observed, that the time of collecting the 

 leaves for the manufacture of the extract, was at 

 the time the shrubs required pruning. This, on 

 passing through a plantation, I had an oppor- 

 tunity of witnessing. The too luxuriant branches 

 were cut off" with a pruning knife, collected into 

 baskets, and then conveyed to the boiling-house, 

 which is erected in the midst of Gambir plan- 

 tations, the whole of which, at the period of 

 my visiting them, were in full operation ; the 

 leaves are then stripped from the pruned branches 

 in the boiling-house, and afterwards placed into 

 the Qualie or cauldron ; (which is made of bark, 

 with an iron bottom ;) under this is an enor- 



