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and the roots again washed. The roots are then grated, or pounded 

 in wooden mortars, or crushed between rollers. The pulp is put 

 into clear water, and very thoroughly mixed up by stirring. This 

 process separates the starch grains from the fibrous portion which 

 is removed by straining through sieves of progressive fineness. 

 The water containing the starch grains, is allowed to settle, when 

 the water is run off. To obtain the finest article, the washings 

 are repeated several times, and all contamination avoided with 

 dust, &c, or even iron in the water. The starch is dried on calico 

 trays in the sun, and packed in cases as soon as possible. The 

 fibrous refuse is good feeding for pigs. About 100 lbs. of arrow- 

 root may be obtained from 4 barrels of cleaned roots ; and from 

 25 to 30 barrels from the acre. (Seitaminece.) 



Mauritia flexuosa, Linn. f. — The iEta Palm. Charles Kingsley, in 

 his very interesting book, " At Last," speaks of this palm, as he 

 saw it growing in the forests of Trinidad : — 



" The forest ended, and a scene opened before us which made me 

 understand the admiration which Humboldt and other travellers 

 have expressed at the far vaster savannas of the Oroonoco. 



" A large sheet of grey-green grass, bordered by the forest wall, as 

 far as the eye could see, and dotted with low bushes, weltered in 

 mirage ; while stretching out into it, some half a mile off, a grey 

 promontory into a green sea, — was an object which filled me with 

 more awe and admiration than any thing which I had seen in the 

 Island. 



" It was a wood of Moriche palms ; like a Greek temple, many 

 hundred yards in length, and, as I guessed, nearly a hundred feet 

 in height ; and like a Greek temple, ending abruptly at its full 

 height. The grey columns, perfectly straight and parallel, sup- 

 ported a dark roof of leaves, grey underneath, and reflecting above 

 from their broad fans, sheets of pale glittering light. Such sere- 

 nity of grandeur I never saw in any group of trees ; and when we 

 rode up to it and tethered our horses in its shade, it seemed to me 

 almost irreverent not to kneel and worship in that temple not made 

 with hands. 



" The short, smooth columns of the Moriches towered around us 

 till, as we looked through the "pillared shade," the eye was lost in 

 the green abysses of the forest. Overhead, their great fan 

 leaves form a groined roof, compared with which that of St. Mary 

 Redcliff , or even of King's College, is as clumsy as all man's works 

 are beside the works of God 



" The noble Moriche palm delights in wet, at least in Trinidad, 

 and on the lower Oroonoco, but Schomburgk describes forests of 

 them — if indeed, it be the same species — as growing in the moun- 

 tains of Guiana up to an altitude of four thousand feet. The soil in 

 which they grow here is half pitch pavement, half loose brown 

 earth, and over both, shallow pools of water, which will become 

 much deeper in the wet season ; and all about float or lie their 

 pretty fruit, the size of an apple, and scaled like a fir-cone. They 

 are last year's, empty and decayed. The ripe fruit contains first a 

 rich, pulpy nut, and at last a hard cone, something like that of the 



