BALSAMUM TOLUTANUM. 203 



B. siccurn, — the last with the explanatory words, "trochiei' Balsam in 

 der Kilrhsen' {i.e. in gourds), meaning probably balsam of Tolu. 



As to the tree, of which Monardes figured a broken pod, leaflets of 

 it, marked 1758, exist in Sloane's herbarium. Humboldt and Bonpland 

 saw it in several places in New Granada during their travels (1799- 

 180i), but succeeded only in gathering a few leaves. Among recent 

 collectors, Warszewicz, Triana, Sutton Hayes, and Seemann were 

 successful only in obtaining leaves. Weir in 1863 was more happy, 

 for by causing a large tree of nearly 2 feet diameter to be felled, 

 he procured good herbarium specimens including pods, but no flowers. 

 Owing to this tree having been much wounded for balsam, its foliage 

 and fruits were singularly small and stunted, and its branches over- 

 grown with lichens. 



That which botanists had failed to do, has been accomplished by an 

 ornithologist, Mr. Anton Goering, who, travelling in Venezuela to col- 

 lect birds and insects, made it a special object, at the urgent request of 

 one of us (H.), to procure complete specimens of the Balsam of Tolu 

 tree. By dint of much perseverance and by watching for the proper 

 season, Mr. Goering obtained in December 1868 excellent flowering 

 specimens and young fruits, and subsequently mature seeds from which 

 plants have been raised in England, Ceylon and Java. 



Extraction — The most authentic information we possess on this 

 subject is derived from Mr. John Weir, plant collector to the Royal 

 Horticultural Society of London, who when about to undertake a 

 journey to New Granada in 1863, received instructions to visit the 

 locality producing Balsam of Tolu. After encountering considerable 

 difficulties, Air. Weir succeeded in observing the manner of collectins: 

 the balsam in the forest near Plato, on the right bank of the Mag- 

 dalena. Mr. Weir's information^ may be thus summarized : — 



The balsam tree has an average height of 70 feet with a straight 

 trunk, generally rising to a height of 40 feet before it branches. The 

 balsam is collected by cutting in the bark two deep sloping notches, 

 meeting at their lower ends in a sharp angle. Below this V-shaped 

 cut, the bark and wood is a little hollowed out, and a calabash of the 

 size and shape of a deep tea-cup is fixed. This arrangement is repeated, 

 so that as many as twenty calabashes may be seen on various parts of 

 the same trunk. When the lower part has been too much wounded to 

 give space for any fresh incisions, a rude scaffold is sometimes erected, 

 and a new series of notches made higher up. The balsam-gatherer goes 

 from time to time round the trees with a pair of bags of hide, slung 

 over the back of a donkey, and empties into them the contents of 

 the calabashes. In these bags the balsam is sent down to the ports 

 where it is transferred to the cylindrical tins in which it reaches 

 Europe. The bleeding of the trees goes on for at least eight months of 

 the year, causing them ultimately to become much exhausted, and thin 

 in foliage. 



In some districts, as we learn from another traveller, it is customary 

 to let the balsam flow down the trunk into a receptacle at its base, 

 formed of the large leaf of a species of Calathea. 



From the observations of Mr. Weir, it appears that the balsam tree 



1 Journ. of the R. Hort. Soc., May 1864; Pharm. Journ. vi. (1865) 60. 



