Edible Products. 



208 



[September, 1910. 



to be done daring the early part of 

 the year. The planting of the seed to 

 be done in June when the monsoon has 

 fairly broken and rain can be counted 

 upon almost daily. Of course the ad- 

 vantage of this system is that all the 

 roots are at perfect liberty to take their 

 own natural directions from the first, 

 and the young tree grows away much 

 faster and has the chance of making a 

 much healthier tree all through, I have 

 never tried it, but can quite appreciate 

 all the points in its favour when it has 

 been rightly gone about- In any case 

 there can be no hesitation about declar- 

 ing that broadcasting the seed in the 

 nurse- : y is a mistake. When the plants 

 come up they come up too crowded, no 

 matter how thinly you may try to 

 broadcast, and are, in consequence, 

 stunted in the nursery to start with. 

 Twenty trees per acre are all that are 

 required, and the extra amount of 

 labour attached to planting each seed 

 individually and at regular distances to 

 enable them to be lifted with a ball of 

 earth at their roots is nothing iu com- 

 parison with the benefits derived. 



Some gardens have been trying for 

 many years to get covered with the 

 " Sau" tree, but don't appear to be able 

 to manage it thoroughly. Upon some 

 soils the "Sau" will never grow satis- 

 factorily, but when its near relative the 

 "Karia" (Albizzia odoratissima) is plant- 

 ed it grows well enough, Then in some 

 garden soils neither the "Sau" nor the 

 " Karia " will succeed, but I would be 

 inclined to doubt those soils being much 

 good for tea either. The experience of 

 most planters is that if tea does not do 

 well, and this proves to be the fault 

 of the soil, either physically and mechan- 

 ically, it is little use planting either 

 "Sau "or "Karia" until such time as 

 the soil is improved. Such improvement 

 is generally quite possible, but on some 

 gardens it might require such an expen- 

 diture as to render it commercially un- 

 sound to attempt it. The writer has 

 seen the "Sau" which is an indigenous 

 tree in most tea districts, growing in 

 dhanket land luxuriantly, under condi- 

 tions in which the tea plant would make 

 no headway- On the other hand he 

 has also seen it planted time after time 

 upon a well drained flat where tea did 

 fairly well but the "Sau" would not 

 grow at all. It sometimes springs up 

 spontaneously all over a new clearance, 

 not only during the first year, but year 

 after year thousands of fine young 

 seedlings may be hoed in. There are 

 such a number of remarkable ways in 

 which the distribution of seeds is accom- 

 plished, that we need not be so much ' 



surprised at this as we are sometimes 

 inclined to be. The seed of the Albizzia 

 has none of the appliances possessed 

 by wind-sown seeds, but when it is 

 thoroughly ripe it is provided with an 

 extremely hard outer shell. It is of a 

 size, shape, and appearance to commend 

 it as a food for our smaller birds. The 

 consistency of its pericarp renders it 

 impervious to the attacks of the bird's 

 digestion, and consequently its voidance 

 in a perfectly sound condition is inevit- 

 able If the general environment and 

 conditions of soil are suitable for the 

 voided seeds' successful germination we 

 have a fine crop of young Albizzia plants. 

 It would be difficult to choose a piece of 

 ground more suitable in every way not 

 only for the seeds' germination but also, 

 if left aloue, for its growing into a full- 

 ::ized tree, than newly opened jungle 

 land for tea. There can be no mistaking 

 a young Albizzia stipulata plant any- 

 where. Planters may doubt their iden- 

 tity, and when taking so much trouble 

 with their young "Sau" plants there 

 may be thousands of them being turned 

 in with the hoe on the very ground they 

 are having planted at the rate of twenty 

 to the acre. There is continual aud 

 relentless war throughout the vegetable 

 kingdom, and the contest is fiercest 

 amongst members of the same species. 

 If this were not so the great evolution- 

 ary theory would not exist. Sometimes 

 we unconsciously upset nature's plan 

 entirely, and when this occurs she brings 

 forth in abundance those particular 

 plants which our interference has bene- 

 fited most. This occurs when we clear 

 land for tea which happens to have a 

 soil which suits the requirements of the 

 Albizzia stipulata. If the jungle had not 

 been cut and the ground kept tolerably 

 clear it is questionable if one in ten 

 thousand of the "Sau" seeds dropped 

 would have germinated, although there 

 can be no reasonable doubt but that 

 just as many seeds would have been 

 dropped if the jungle had never been 

 cut. 



THE SOY BEAN. 



By James Hendrick, b.sc-, f.i.c. 



(From Transactions of The Highland 

 and Agricultural Society of 

 Scotland, Vol. XXII.') 



The Soy bean, also known as the Soya 

 or Soja bean (Glycine hispida) is a 

 leguminous plant extensively cultivated 

 in China, Japan, Manchuria, and Corea. 

 This bean has recently been shipped to 

 this country in immense quantities fiom 

 the ports of North China aud Manchuria 



