18G LEGUMINOS^. 



partially soluble in ammonia. Small shreds of copper were also visible 

 to the naked eye. The dried juice yielded 6'3 per cent, of ash. 



Corigliano liquorice treated in the same manner gave 71 "2 per cent, 

 of extract soluble in cold water ; Barracco liquorice 64"9. 



The small liquorice lozenges known as Pontefract Cakes (Dunhill's), 

 not previously dried, gave 71 per cent, of matter soluble in cold water. 



Commerce — The value of the imports of Liquorice into the United 

 Kingdom has been for the last five yesLVH as follows : — 



1868 1869 1870 1871 1872 



£89,482 £83,832 £70,165 £55,120 £75,991 



The last-named sum represents a quantity of 28,000 cwt., of which 

 11,170 cwt. were furnished by Italy, and the remainder by Turkey, 

 France, Spain and other countries. 



The total exports of Liquorice Paste from Smyrna were estimated 

 in 1872 as 1,200 to 1,400 tons (24,000 to 28,000 cwt.) per annum. 



Uses — Stick liquorice is sucked as a remedy for coughs^ and by 

 children as a sweetmeat. It is also used in lozenges, and in some 

 pharmacopoeias is admitted as the raw material from which to prepare 

 soft extract of liquorice. 



The block liquoi'ice, of which a large quantity is imported, is chiefly 

 used in the manufacture of tobacco for smoking and chewing. 



OLEUM ARACHIS. 



Ground-nut oil, Earth-nut oil, Pea-nut oil, Arachis oil ; F. Huilc 

 d'Arachide ou de Pistache de terre ; G. Erdnussol. 



Botanical Origin — AracMshypogcea L., a diffuse herbaceous annual 

 plant, having stems a foot or two long, and solitaiy axillary flowers with 

 an extremely long filiform calyx-tube. After the flower withers, the 

 torus supporting the ovary becomes elongated as a rigid stalk, which 

 bends down to the ground and forces into it the young pod, which 

 matures its seeds some inches below the surface. The ripe pod is oblong, 

 cylindrical, about an inch in length, indehiscent, reticulated, and contains 

 one or two, or exceptionally even four irregularly ovoid seeds. 



The plant is cultivated for the sake of its nutritious oily seeds in all 

 tropical and subtropical countries, but especially on the west coast of 

 Africa. It is unknown in the wild state. De Candolle^ regards it as a 

 native of Brazil, to which region the other species of the genus 

 exclusively belong. But the opinion of one of us^ is strongly in favour 

 of the plant being indigenous to Tropical Africa, and so is that also of 

 Schweinfurth. Arachis is one of the most universally cultivated plants 

 throughout Tropical Africa, frorii Senegambia to lake Tanganyika. In 

 Europe it has not proved remunerative. 



History — The first writer to notice Ground Nut appears to be 

 Fernandez de Oviedo y Valdes, who lived in Hayti from a.d. 1513 to 

 1525; he mentions in his Cronica de las Indias^ that the Indians culti- 



^ Geographic Botanique, ii. (1855) 963. ^JAh. vii. cap. 5. Fol. 1074 f. (1547), as 



'■* Fliickiger, Ueher die Erdniiss — Archiv quoted by C. Ph. von Martius in Gelehrte 



der Pharmacie, 190. (1869) 70-84, with Annei'jen de?' bayerischen Alciulemie, 1839. 



figure. 969. 



