174 TRACTS ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS, &c. 



there is more heat, you must have seen considerable plantations 

 made this way, and as on these peaks there cannot be any other 

 attention required or for watering, a good deal may be done, by 

 employing some of ihe Chinese in this way. Lower down there 

 are springs, in which many of the forest trees of the Malabar 

 mountains will grow. In furtherance of this object, I will transmit 

 a copy of this letter for introduction in the public prints in India, 

 with the view of soliciting seeds being sent here, and will make 

 particular requests myself to be more certain. I shall request 

 them being directed to the Town Major of St. Helena, to be re- 

 ported by him, and disposed of as government, or individuals may 

 wish. 



It gives me pleasure to learn from you that the fermenting balls 

 which I described in the Madras Gazette of the 22d February, 

 1812, had been so useful as to afford excellent fermented bread 

 to the fleet that sailed at that period for Ehgland. I have not 

 been able to do any thing in the way you wish, of endeavouring 

 to make a similar ferment to improve the bread at St. Helena — 

 not having received the plants I requested, nor a bottle of the 

 juice of the gum-wood tree : but from what 1 tasted of this juice, 

 I think it will afford all that can be required in this way, it being 

 a saccharine juice, which when allowed to approach the acetous 

 fermentation, will so nearly approach the Cocoa nut or Palmira 

 Toddy, as to be equally useful as a ferment. 



On speaking to the baker in James's Town respecting the 

 weakness of his ferment, and of his bread not being sufficiently 

 raised, he attributed the failure to the impurity and badness of 

 the wheat flour: this may certainly be obviated by having grain 

 sent instead of flour, to be ground at St. Helena, by which there 

 would be little danger of its being spoiled or impure. I men- 

 tion this to show that I have not been inattentive to your wish, 



