88 SELECT PLANTS FOR INDUSTRIAL CULTURE 



Copernicia cerifera, Martins.* 



Brazil, extending into Bolivia and also Argentina. This mag- 

 nificient Fan Palm was found hardy at Sydney, by Mr. Charles 

 Moore. It resists drought in a remarkable degree, and prospers 

 also on a somewhat saline soil. The stem furnishes starch ; the 

 sap yields sugar ; the fibres of the leaves are converted into ropes, 

 which resist decay in water : it can also be used for mats, hats, 

 baskets and brooms, and many other articles are prepared from the 

 leaves. The inner part of the leaf-stalks serves as a substitute for 

 cork. Mainly however this palm is valued for its Carnauba wax, 

 with which the young leaves are coated, and which can be detached 

 by shaking ; it is harder than bees'-wax, and is used in candle 

 manufacture. Each tree furnishes about 4 Ibs. annually. In 1862 

 no less than 2,500,000 Ibs. were imported into Great Britain, 

 realising about 100,000. 



Corchorus acutangulus, Lamarck. 



Tropical Africa, South Asia, and North Australia. This species is 

 specially mentioned by some writers as a jute plant. A particular 

 machine has been constructed by Mr. Le Franc, of New Orleans, 

 for separating the jute fibre. With it a ton of fibre is produced in 

 a day by four men's work, and it leaves no butts or refuse. This 

 apparatus can also be used for other fibre plants. The seeds of 

 the Corchorus, which spontaneously drop, will reiterate the crop. 



Corchorus capsularis, Linne.* 



From India to Japan. One of the principal jute plants. An 

 annual, attaining a height of about a dozen feet, when closely 

 grown, with almost branchless stem. A nearly allied but 

 lower plant, Corchorus Cunninghami, F. v. Mueller, occurs in 

 tropical and sub-tropical East Australia. Jute can be grown 

 where cotton and rice ripen, be it even in localities compara- 

 tively cold in the winter, if the summer's warmth is long and 

 continuous. The fibre is separated by steeping the full-grown 

 plant in water from five to eight days, and it is largely used 

 for rice, wool and cotton bags, carpets and other similar 

 textile fabrics, and also for ropes. About 60,000 tons are 

 annually exported from India to England, and a large quantity 

 also to the United States. Jute is sown on good land, well 

 ploughed and drained, but requires no irrigation, although it 

 likes humidity. The crop is obtained in the course of four or 

 five months, and is ripe when the flowers turn into fruit cap- 

 sules. Good paper is made from the refuse of the fibre. Jute 

 has been found, when planted around cotton-fields, to protect 

 them like hemp, from caterpillars (Hon. T. Watts). In 

 India jute alternates with rice or sugar-cane ; as a crop it 



