April 1907.] 



235 



Edible Products 



oil trade was growing less hopeful. The difficulty of obtaining material (a result of 

 local prices) and the flooding of the market with American cotton-seed oil are cited 

 as causes. In fact the competition, not only in regard to cotton-seed oil, but in other 

 oils, and with European ports, has proved too severe for Marseilles. Year after year 

 the price offered for raw material has been reduced in order to meet the falling 

 price of the oil. With other oil-seeds ground-nuts have fallen, and the price for 

 unshelled nuts, which in 1877 stood at 48 francs per 100 kilogrammes, in 1898 stood at 

 30, and in 1895 had been as low as 2Zh {Compte Rendu, 1898.) 



The decreasing interest of Madras, Bombay and Pondicherry, is traceable in 

 a large measure to these falling prices, and also undoubtedly to the deterioration of 

 the crops due to exhaustion of the soil. On p. 197 it was pointed out how crop 

 after crop wears out the land. No wonder considering the richness of the material 

 taken off in the harvest ! As the farmers of Virginia have been forced to recognise 

 land which once yielded 50 bushels per acre presently grudgingly produces 20, and so 

 too with the successive crops of the Indian ryot. Freight has operated against the 

 export trade of India. To save the considerable addition of bulk made by the husk 

 the native has shelled his produce before shipping it, and that carelessly ; fungi and 

 bacteria thereupon commence their ravages on the broken kernels, producing 

 deterioration which, measured by Marseilles prices, is expressed in the following 

 table. It is calculated from data in the Corapte Rendu for 1898, and by allowing 

 that the husk removed takes 23 per cent, from the weight :— 



Prices at Marseilles in Francs per 100 Kilograms. 



Year. 



Undecorticated. 



Estimated cost of 

 100 kilos of kernels 

 in undecorticated 

 nuts. 



Decorticated. 



1875 



31 



40-3 



38 



1876 



31-5 



40'9 



40 



1877 



34 



44-2 



49 



1878 



33-5 



43-5 



42 



1879 



33 



42-9 



39 



1880 



36 



46-8 



39 



1881 



33 



42-9 



34 



1882 



32-5 



42/2 



31 



1883 



35 



45'5 



32 



1884 



33 



42-9 



33 



1885 



25 



32'5 



33 



1886 



22-5 



29-2 



26 



1887 



25 



32-5 



28-5 



1888 



27-5 



35-7 



28-5 



1889 



25 



32-5 



28-5 



1890 



25-5 



331 



27 



1891 



27 



35-1 



28-5 



1892 



26-5 



34-4 



28-5 



1893 



22 



28-6 



27 



1894 



17-5 



22-7 



22-5 



1895 



18-5 



24 



22-5 



1896 



18 



23-4 



26 



1897 



22 



28-6 



30 



1898 



22-5 



29-2 



30 



The cake resulting from the expression of seed, much injured by fungi 

 and bacteria is, like the oil, rancid, and if, as is probable, the fungi again 

 assert themselves after expression, loses its valuable fatty constituents by 

 degrees. " Ritthausen and Baumann have shown that a great loss is caused by fungi 



