Peruvian-barh Trees and their Transplantation. 453 



fever at Babylon, and that Oliver Cromwell was carried off 

 by ague. A few doses of quinine might have saved their 

 lives ; and compelled Clio to make very different entries 

 in her diary than she has done. The whole Walcheren 

 expedition was saved from destruction by a Yankee skipper 

 arriving just in the nick of time with a supply of this medicine. 

 In order to hold many important tropical possessions it is not 

 only necessary for our race to keep the powder dry, but also 

 take care not to let the quinine run too low. In fact the drug- 

 is almost as indispensable to mankind as air itself, and aided 

 by this silent agent Europeans have been able to establish 

 happy homes, busy factories, and flourishing colonies in dis- 

 tricts which, without this invaluable aid, would have simply 

 become their graveyards. Our only wonder is how we could 

 ever have done without it, and what would become of us if the 

 supply should ever fail. And the supply does begin to fail, 

 fail rapidly. It is known that 1,200,000 lbs, of Peruvian 

 bark (meaning by that term all medicinal barks produced 

 by Chinchona trees) are annually imported into England ; and 

 it is estimated that no less than 3,000,000 lbs., and probably 

 a much greater quantity, are consumed every year throughout 

 the world. The demand is daily increasing, and the drain upon 

 the South American forests, including those of New Granada, 

 Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia, has now been going on for more 

 than two centuries, though not to such an extent as at pre- 

 sent. The better kinds, those yielding the largest quantity of 

 alkaloids, are very local in their geographical range at present, 

 often limited to very circumscribed districts ; and though we 

 speak of Chinchona forests, it is absolute delusion to fancy that 

 these trees, like our pines and oaks, form entire woods by 

 themselves. On the contrary, they are intermingled with 

 other trees, and generally occur in isolated specimens. The 

 bark is collected by ignorant Indians, who, improvident of the 

 future, strip the tree anyhow, and in most instances without 

 properly felling it, so that it begins to rot after being robbed 

 of its produce, and has no power to put forth new shoots from 

 the root. Thus, what with the excessive and unceasing de- 

 mand for bark, and the reckless manner of collecting it, large 

 tracts of country, formerly famous for their abundant yield, 

 are now entirely denuded of almost every trace of Chinchona 

 vegetation. The neighbourhood of Loxa in Ecuador was at no 

 very remote period one of the principal localities for several of 

 our best barks ; but when, in 1847, Captain Pirn and I visited 

 the place, we had to go a considerable distance from the town 

 before we obtained even the sight of a single specimen. 

 Stimulated by the present high prices the bark collectors have 

 penetrated the remotest districts, explored wilds probably 



