CORTEX CINCHONiE. 347 



circled. This done, he begins in most cases at once to remove, after a 

 previous beating, the sapless layer of outer bark. In order to detach 

 the valuable inner bark, longitudinal and transverse incisions are made as 

 high as can be reached on the stem. The tree is then felled, and the 

 peeling completed. In most cases, but especially if previously beaten, 

 the bark separates easily from the wood. In many localities it has to 

 be dried by a fire made on the floor of a hut, the bark being placed on 

 hurdles above, — a most imperfect arrangement. In Southern Peru and 

 Bolivia however, according to Weddell, even the thickest Calisaya bark 

 is dried in the sun without requiring the aid of the fire. 



The thinner bark as it dries rolls up into tubes or quills called 

 canutos or canutillos, while the pieces stripped from the trunks are 

 made to dry flat by being placed one upon another and loaded with 

 weights, and are then known as jpluncha or tahla. The bark of the root 

 was formerly neglected, but is now in several instances brought into the 

 mai'ket. 



After drying, the barks are either assorted, chiefly according to 

 size, or all are packed without distinction in sacks or bales. In some 

 places, as at Popayan, the bark is even stamped, in order to reduce its 

 bulk as much as possible. The dealers in the export towns enclose the 

 bark in serons^ of raw bullock-hide, which, contracting as it dries, 

 tightly compresses the contents (100 lb. or more) of the package. In 

 many places however wooden chests are used for the packing of bark. 



Conveyance to the Coast and Commercial Statistics — The 

 ports to which bark is conveyed for shipment to Europe are not very 

 numerous. 



Guayaquil on the Pacific coast is the most important for produce 

 of Ecuador. The quantity shipped thence in 1871 was 7,859 quintals.- 

 Pitayo bark is largely exported from Buenaventura in the Bay of Choco 

 further north. 



Pay ta, the most northerly port of Peru, and CaUao, the port of Lima, 

 likewise export bark, the latter being the natural outlet for the barks of 

 Central Peru from Huanuco to Cusco. 



Islay, and more particularly Arica, receive the valuable barks of 

 Carabaya and of the high vaUeys of Bolivia. In 1877 the expoi-t of Arica 

 was equal to 5100 cwt. 



The barks of Peru and Bolivia find an exceptional outlet also by the 

 Amazon and its tributaries, and are shipped to Europe from port of 

 Brazil. Howard^ has given an interesting account of one of the first 

 attempts to utilize this eastern route, made by Senr. Pedro Bada in 

 1868. 



There is a large export of the barks of New Granada, principally 

 from Santa Marta, whence the shipments^ in 1871 were 3,415,149 lb. ; 

 and in 1872, 2,758,991 lb. From the neighbouring port of Savanilla, 

 which represents the city of Barranquilla, the sea-terminus of the navi- 

 gation of the Magdalena, the export of bark in 1871 was 1,043,835 lb., 

 value £38,715;* it amounted to 2 millions of kilogrammes in 1877. 

 All Columbia is stated, in 1877, to have shipped Sh millions of kilo- 



^ From zurrdn, the Spanish name for a ^ Seemann's Jburn. of Bot. vi. (1868) 323. 



poach or game-bag. * Conmlar Reports, August 1873. 743. 



- Conmlar Reports, presented to Parlia- » jf^ August 1872. 

 ment, July 1872. 



