3 



u F or tho details concerning cultivation here presonted I am chiefly indebted to Mr. Oscar Lohse, 

 one of the most intelligent cultivators in this country, and proprietor of the Finca of San Antonio, two 

 leagues from the town of Caroica, Yungas. 



" The district of Caroica may be considered as fitly representing the remainder of Yungas as 

 representing the principal Coca districts of this republic. Tho conditions of soil and climate may be 

 briefly stated. Proceeding eastward from La Paz, itself somewhat more than ten thousand feet above 

 the sea, for a distance of four or five leagues, we reach the summit of the pass over the easternmost 

 Cordillera of the Andes, this cordillera having an average elevation in this immediate district of perhaps 

 sixteen thousand feet. This ridge, always more or less snow-covered, cuts off a large portion of the 

 westward-bound clouds, which are either'precipirnted in the form of rain before reaching the summit, 

 or, arriving there, are deposited in the form of snow, and then returned by means of rivulets to the 

 valleys, chiefly of the eastern slope. It should be noted that in Northern Peru and Ecuador this cor- 

 dilleia is higher than here, so that the eastern 6lope in those regions is more profusely and regularly 

 watered than here. From this pass, had we a direct road, we could travel in half a day, so steep is the 

 descent, to the banks of the Caroica River, having un altitude of only two thousand four hundred feet. 

 When we have descended to six thousand four hundred feet we should meet with our first Coca plan- 

 tations, and after passing the two thousand foot level we should have left them principally or entirely 

 behind. Within this four or five thousand feet, then, lie the cocales of Bolivia. No description can 

 convey a perfect idea of the steepness of this luxuriant slope. Travel, entirely by riding-animals, is 

 extremely difficult. There are only occasional places where we can readily leave the road, and here 

 plantations are established. The hedge of Coffee-plants at the roadside proves on examination to be 

 the uppermost row of a plantation ; and as we peer down among the s'\rubs we marvel that anyone 

 can preserve his footing while cultivating or collecting the coffee. The scenery is of course magnificent, 

 and of a different type, I should think, from that of any other part of the world. The mountains are 

 too young to have lost to a great extent their ragged out-line, yet softness is imparted by the richness 

 of the vegetation. We stand among the coca-plants and distinctly see another ocoal nearly four 

 thousand feet below us. 



"The cultivated plants of the coca district are coffee, rice, cacao, sugar cane, tobacco, maize, cotton, 

 (the arborescent species), sweet potatos, yuccas, and the ordinary garden vegetables. The principal 

 fruits are oranges, bananas, coconuts, lemons (sweet and 60ur), citrons, grapes, chirimoyas, alligator 

 pears, tumbas, pomegranates, grenadillas, figs, papayas, lukmas, melons, and pine apples, the last just 

 introduced. 



" The soil in such a broken country is of course very diversified, ranging from a very light decom- 

 posed shale or sandstone to a heavy blue or chiefly yellow clay. 



" The rainy season begins in October, and continues until May or June. During this time the 

 rains are copious and almost constant. During the succeeding two months there is scarcely a drop of 

 rain, and during the next two there are occasional showers. 



" Such are the conditions under which the Coca grows in this section. 



" When we come now to consider the methods of cultivation here adopted, we must be cautious 

 about accepting them as the best, merely because they are generally followed here. It is to be remem- 

 bered that the Bolivian system of agriculture has not received the attention that it should have had, 

 and that it is very probable that reforms might be introduced in present methods. 



" Nor is it proper to proceed concerning Coca-culture without a few words concerning what is 

 meant by the " best quality" of Coca-leaves. To a manufacturing chemist the best quality would 

 mean the quality that would yield the largest percentage of crystallizable cocaine, obtainable in the 

 easiest manner, while the same Coca might be considered for domestic consumption as representing 

 one of the lower grade. It is highly probable that the amount of cocaine forms no element in the 

 Indian's estimate of the quality of Coca, no more than the percentage of nicotine establishes the quality 

 of a particular grade of tobacco. Coca-leaves are classed in general by the Indians as " Lajas dulces'* 

 (sweet leaves) and " Lajas amargas" (bitter leaves). The former are made sweet by the abundance of 

 alkaloids other than cocaine. While it is true that a greater abundance of those alkaloids is usually 

 accompanied by a larger percentage of cocaine also, yet the variation in the amount of the latter is not 

 so great as in the former; so that while in the sweet leaves the bitter taste of the cocaine is masked by 

 the presence of the other alkaloids, in the bitter leaves its flavour is the predominant one. The pre- 

 sence, then, of these sweet alkaloids, as we may call them, translating the simple and expressive term of 

 the Indians, determines the domestic value of the Coca, and all that is known of the bost methods of 

 cultivation is based on the produclion of the highest percentage of these alkaloids. Experience may 

 determine that for manufacturing purposes a very different line of principles of culture should be 

 followed. 



" I have made a large number of assays tending towards elevations, soils, exposures, seasons, ages 

 of plants, and of leaves, different varieties, wild and domestic, different parts of the plant, and various 

 modes of drying and packing. The results will ba embodied in a future monograph, mere passing re- 

 ferences being made to them for the present. I have about concluded that the percentage of the sweet 

 alkaloi Is varies inversely as the amount and continuousness of mois'.ure that the plant receives. Thus, 

 the Peruvian, Ecuadorian, and Brazilian Coca, which, as I h:ive stated, is much mora copiously and 

 regularly watered than the Bolivian, is markedly interior, so that Bolivia regularly exports ab:>ut one- 

 eighth of her crop to those countries. I am inclined to think that the greater breadth and thinness of 

 the northern leaf may be partly due to the greater water-supply and the consequent greater degree of 

 evaporation. Again, the Indian always seeks the Coca grown at the higher elevations, where the 

 humidity is much less and more irregular than in the districts along the rivers. We arc thus obliged, 

 for reasons to be elaborated in the future, to regard these alkaloids as preserving a sort of a balance of 

 moisture, by which the plant stores up during the wet weather a concentrated supply of water, which 

 may be very slowly yielded up during a time of need. 



