26l 



and can be seen from the railway. M. rnalaccensis is easily 

 distinguished from the other wild one Musa violascens by its 

 glaucous foliage and purple-brown bracts, M. violascens has 

 violet bracts, the colour of a brinjal, and an erect spike. It is 

 more slender and has plain green leaves. This latter, not so 

 extremely common as the M. rnalaccensis, has not yet had a 

 really fair trial as a fibre plant, and may prove better. 



Careful preparation of the fibre from stems before flowering 

 should give a good return, and considering that the only cultiva- 

 tion required is to clear away the scrub round the plant and let it 

 grow, there seems no reason why this source of profit should be 

 neglected. 



Mr. Machado's samples were small but he showed a finer 

 cleaner lot in his excellent collection of fibres at the late exhibi- 

 tion, where he easily carried off first prize. Readers will note in 

 Professor Dunstan's report the allusion to the high price of fibres 

 just now. There is, in fact, a very large demand for fibres of all 

 kinds, and this is more likely to increase as years go on than to 

 decrease. Some, and this includes bananas, might well be grown 

 as catch crops in rubber. Again, this is work in which the natives 

 might well be employed. The Malays would be encouraged to 

 bring in some of the wild fibres of which our forests contain many 

 if there was a buyer for them, stationed at some such place as 

 Kuala Lumpur. This suggestion was made some years ago in 

 the Bulletin apropos of Kabong fibre, for w 7 hich there was a 

 considerable demand in tons, but it is one of those fibres only 

 collected in small lots by Malays, and what w r as wanted was a 

 fibre buyer who would take small lots in the districts and 

 accumulate them into sufficient bulk to be saleable in Liverpool, 

 or Hamburg. As it is a great deal of the forest wealth lies 

 ungathered for want of some such system. 



REPORT ON A SPECIMEN OF BENZOIN 

 FROM THE FEDERATED MALAY STATES 



BY 



Professor Wyndham R. Dunstan, m.a., f.r.s., Director, 

 Imperial Institute, South Kensington, London. 



This sample of benzoin was sent to the Imperial Institute, 

 by the Curator of the Selangor State Museum, Kuala Lumpur, 

 and is referred to in his letter No. 87/05, dated November 24, 

 1905. It was stated that the product was derived from a 

 species of Styrax which is fairly common in the neighbourhood 

 of Kuala Lumpur, and that considerable quantities might be 

 forthcoming if the value of resin were sufficient to make its 

 collection remunerative. 



