Botanical Miscellany. 565 



consequence, very few varieties. Along the banks of the Ganges, its native 

 region, the cane perfects its seed; and being frequently raised in this 

 manner, it produces innumerable varieties. The oldest cane of the West 

 Indies is called the country cane,- there is also the riband cane, the 

 Bourbon cane, and the violet or Batavian cane. " The cane is a plant of 

 a warm latitude; its growth being in proportion to the heat of the climate, 

 and the fertility of the soil. It may be considered as the production of 

 the highest effort of the powers of vegetation. In almost all other plants, 

 it is only during the germination of the seed, the most active period of 

 their lives, that the sweet principle is to be detected. In the cane it is at 

 all times to be found, and that in quantities surpassing what exists in all 

 other plants put together. It is on our plains that the cane reaches all 

 the perfection of which it is capable in these islands. Yet even here, 

 according to report, its size and luxuriance are inferior to what it attains 

 in Madagascar, the Isle of France, and the districts of the East, more 

 immediately beneath the equator. Like all gramineous plants, it delights 

 in a rather moist climate. When the rains, however, are excessive, a rank 

 luxuriance is the consequence, unfavourable to the maturation of the plant; 

 the juices it affords being watery and deficient in the saccharine principle, 

 yielding in crystallization a dark-coloured sugar." The cane demands a 

 fertile soil ; and there is no plant in the cultivation of which manuring should 

 be carried to a greater extent. A succession of crops is adopted by the 

 best cultivators ; and 3-ams, arrow root, or other plants cultivated for man 

 or cattle, not gramineous, intervene with the cane. Burning of lands, as 

 a species of manuring, is carried to a blamable extent in some parts of the 

 island. Irrigation is extensively employed on some estates. In the com- 

 mon practice of planting the cane, " parallel trenches are dug, little more 

 than six inches in depth, and the same in breadth ; a hard bank being left 

 on each side, on which the earth removed from the trench is raised. The 

 defect of this system is, that only a slight depth of soil is brought into 

 cultivation ; whilst the hard ridge left on each side of the cane-hole must 

 give a very limited space for the developement of the roots, and conse- 

 quently restrict the plant in its supply of nourishment." A better plan is, 

 previously to digging the trenches, to turn over the whole surface with 

 the plough. The cuttings of the cane are planted in the bottom of the 

 trench or pit. The pits or plants are placed at distances proportionate to 

 the richness of the soil, and the moisture of the climate; but the range of 

 this distance is not mentioned. The top of the stalk is generally employed 

 as a cutting, being otherwise useless. The writer of this paper, Dr. Mac- 

 fadyen of Jamaica, suggests the idea of taking a cutting from the centre of 

 the stem where the juices are riehest, with a view to obtaining a plant of 

 more vigorous growth. The young plants are earthed up as they grow, 

 and in 14 or 16 months it is fit to cut over for the first time. The suckers 

 or ratoons which form the succeeding crops require a less time to arrive at 

 perfection, and are generally cut at from 10 to 12 months. How long a 

 plantation lasts is not mentioned, and indeed the article is by no means so 

 complete as it should be. The editor has added, from Dr. Ure's Chemistry, 

 an account of the processes employed for the production of sugar from 

 .the cane. — Monoclea crispata ; Crj'ptogamia Hepaticse. This liverwort 

 grows in small tufts on the branches of trees in the Island of St. Vincent, 

 and was sent thence to Dr. Hooker by our correspondent the Rev. Lans- 

 down Guilding. — ^inapis frutescens. A shrubby weak entangled-branched 

 shrub, hanging down on the face of rocks in the Island of Madeira. Sent 

 to Dr. Hooker by the Rev. R. T. Lowe. — Weissia reticulata ; Cryptogamia 

 Jiusci. A moss from the Cape. — Guildingk /jsididides ; 10 and 11, and 

 ilfemecyleae. A shrub from the Island of Martinique, approaching in cha- 

 racter to one of the iliyrtaceas. — Phascum tetragonum ; Cryp. ilfusci. A 

 very interesting little African moss from the Cape of Good Hope. — Draba 



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