?36 



THE 



GARDENERS' MAGAZINE. 



1 The Cinchona in India. 



(Concluded from page 217.) 



Collection of Bark. 



In Sikkim, the periodical crops of bark will be got from thinnings and primings 

 from the fourth or fifth year up to the twelfth year, when the trees will be at their 

 best, and it is then more profitable to totally uproot, and plant on fresh land, 

 than to allow them to remain longer in the ground. The plan originally laid down 

 was to plant out 2,400 acres, and afterwards keep up this area by uprooting 200 

 acres annually and planting as much ; but factory demands and other circum- 

 stances often compelled modifications, although in the main the plan was adhered 

 to till of late years, when it was found that bark for the factory could be got from 

 Travancore and elsewhere at less than it cost to grow in Sikkim, where planting 

 operations have consequently been restricted of late. So Sikkim is gradually 

 becoming more of a manufacturing than a cultivating centre for the East India 

 cinchona industry. When the trees are uprooted, the bark of the larger roots, 

 stems, and thick branches, is collected by peeling or beating off with wooden 

 mallets. The smaller branches and roots are peeled by pulling them smartly 

 through between two upright sticks stuck firmly and closely together in the ground 

 when the bark comes away in ribbons. One or two heavy and cumbrous machines 

 have been invented for collecting this small bark, but none has answered better 

 than the two simple sticks stuck in the ground, which reminds one of the old story 

 of the inventor and his cabbage-cutting machine, which, the inventor declared, 

 after all its good points had been explained and praised, cut cabbages nearly as 

 well as an old kitchen table knife did. The bark is at once spread out to dry either 

 in open or heated sheds according to the weather, and when properly dried and 

 protected from damp and rot, will remain chemically unchanged for scores, or 

 perhaps hundreds of years. Although the total uprootal plan is the most profitable 

 for Sikkim, it is by no means so for countries geographically better situated for 

 the growth of cinchonas. On the Nilgiris, for^ instance, where several species 

 thrive to perfection, the usual plan of collecting is that devised by the late Mr. 

 Mclvor, the first superintendent of the Madras Government Plantations, and 

 usually known as the stripping process. By it the half of the stem bark is 

 taken from the standing trees in vertical strips of about an inch and a half in 

 width, from the collar up to the lower branches, or as high as may be thought 

 advisable. If the trees are quite healthy the bark will part from the wood, at the 

 proper season, of course, with the greatest ease, and leave the cambium layer 

 uninjured. 



Immediately after the stripping, the stem is covered thickly with moss, or other 

 soft substances, to exclude the weather. From the edges of the cuts, and all over 

 the surface of the cambium layer, the new bark forms evenly and with marvellous 

 rapidity. In a year, or less, the renewed bark will be as thick as the original, 

 and the remaining strips of original bark may be taken. Afterwards there may 

 be annual collections of renewed bark for a considerable number of years. It is 

 a curious fact that the renewed bark is much richer than the original in quinine, 

 and consequently more valuable — often to the extent of 25 to 50 per cent. The 

 plan requires generous treatment of the trees in the way of manure and cultivation, 

 as only trees in vigorous growth will stand it ; but it well repays the extra 

 expenditure. For this discovery, and many other things, the cinchona industry 

 is heavily indebted to Mr. Mclvor, perhaps more so than to any other man. 

 Several modifications of his stripping plan have been tried, but none has succeeded 

 so well. Perhaps the best of them is the shaving plan of the Dutch in Java. By 

 it the outer half of the bark, all round the stem, is removed with spoke-shaves, 

 and the stem covered up in Mclvor's way. As it is well known that the great 

 proportion of the alkaloids is located in the outer half of the bark, and very 

 little in the inner, it is claimed for this plan that the whole of the useful factory 

 bark can be removed by it, and the useless left behind to carry on the life-work of 

 the tree. 



It was also supposed to be less injurious to the trees, but, according to my 

 experience, it is quite the other way. Mclvor's plan, which was in operation 

 many years before it, no doubt suggested it to the Dutch. Coppicing was tried 

 in Sikkim, but was a commercial failure, as by it we lost the bark from the 

 original roots, which usually amounted to quite one-third of the whole out-turn. 

 As the coppice shoots grew, they threw out new roots for themselves and the old 

 ones died, and their bark was lost to us for ever. 



Manufacture of Quinine. 



After the collection of the bark its plan of disposal had to be decided. The 

 easiest plan, which also would have been the most profitable for the plantation for 

 many years, would have been to sell the bark in London, and buy back the 

 manufactured sulphate of quinine. But the Government, both in India and at 

 home, were anxious to have it worked up at the plantations, so as to save the 

 heavy transport charges, and at the same time render India independent of other 

 countries for her quinine supplies. The Madras plantations being the oldest, 

 were the first to attempt local manufacture, but after some years of continual 

 failure gave up the scheme as hopeless. Their experiments were conducted by 

 Mr. Broughton, the quinologist to the Madras Government, who did most 

 excellent and useful work in his laboratory, but did not succeed so well in the 

 factory. So his experimental factory was shut up and the bark sent for sale to 

 London, where for many years it fetched most profitable rates. But the Bengal 

 Government, who began their manufacturing experiments a little later than 

 Madras, persevered till success was attained. Now Madras finds it pays better to 

 adopt the Bengal plan of local manufacture than to ship the bark. There were 

 numerous processes tried at the Bengal plantations, but it will suffice to give brief 

 details of the three principal. The first, which was started in Madras, and 

 afterwards tried in Bengal, was supposed to be the process then worked by the 

 European makers of sulphate of quinine, who, however, gave no information on 

 the subject, but jealously guarded their trade secrets, which, of course, was 

 perfectly legitimate and business-like, but plainly showed that no help in starting 

 quinine making m India was to be had from them. By this plan the alkaloids 

 were extracted from the bark by repeated hot digestion with water mixed with a 

 little sulphuric acid, and afterwards precipitated from the acidulated liquours with 

 miik-oMime. The precipitate was collected on calico filters, dried, powdered, 

 ana treated with strong hot spirits ot^ine to dissolve out the soluble alkaloids 

 tZI Jif m 1 so l ub 1 le su, Phate of lime which formed the bulk of the precipitate. 

 A\h^ 1 £ ,c ? ho1 ' containing the alkaloids in solution, was mixed with a little 

 IS !*♦ JPr an ? . recovered by distillation for future use, and the remaining 



She, oil i tr £ ated * n the or dinary way for the recovery of the quinine and 

 ^nli tV • ~i , plan P roved a miserable failure both in Madras and 



SS^rSXX?^^ 1 ^^ alkaloids, and was tedious and costly to 

 SSLrfEr^ chemicals required to work it were mostly 



where StuI 5*' 2° m P°^ consideration in a mountainous country, 



viol SSS^JtSL and expensive - Lime was found and burnt on 2c 



place , carbonate of potash was made from the ashes of Artemisia and other 



ApR,L 9, 180R 



indigenous plants ; and the alcohol from Indian corn grown hv * 

 squatters. The method of spirit-making adopted was the nn. • he ^ 

 among the hill tribes of the Eastern Himalayas and differs f m P Deral u * 

 process for making grain spirit in dispensing with the malting-ste? tV? 

 corn is coarsely ground, and heated till soft in as much water » ?/ -n C Indi *A 

 then mixed with a small quantity of powdered ferment-cake anH • °P: 

 lined with bracken-fronds to ferment. When sufficiently ferrnP^V m ?- Ulkel1 

 mass, with a little added water, is treated in the usual wav n L V *** 

 Afterwards, the weak spirit thus got is put through a rectifying still f ° rdlna 7 

 60 degrees over proof, the strength required. The ferment cakes art £l\ * ^ to 

 same principle as mushroom spawn, and consist of rice and the folh aT 011 ** 

 of a rather pretty-flowering Himalayan shrub-Polygala arilatalS^ 

 together. The soft mass is made into round cakes an inch thirW IS \ ■ i.* 

 with a little old ferment cake in powder. The cakes are then packed awfS? 

 among fern fronds in a warm place, and the light excluded till the ferm^ f™2 

 has permeated them, when they may be dried and stored for future usT h** 

 matter of common belief among all the tribes that whoever makes these calc 

 be ever after afflicted with sterility, so only women beyond a certain age wiiulv 

 them. I do not suppose there is any real foundation for this idea but in d*aK 

 with eastern people it is always wise to respect their little prejudices and am? 

 stitions. ™' 

 The second plan to be described was a very simple one, and inexpensive to 

 work, but unfortunately, like the last, missed a large proportion of the aJkaloii 

 For a good many years, however, it did good, useful work, while a bettcriwl 

 being devised. It was never used in the manufacture of sulphate of quinine bar 

 only for making the medicine known in India as cinchona febrifuge, which is a 

 mixture of the whole of the alkaloids, both amorphous and crystallisable, fovnd in 

 the Red Bark. It is not so elegant a preparation as sulphate of quinine' but is in 

 excellent substitute for it in malarial fevers. In fact, some of the best I 



Giac 



doctors prefer it. For some years it was sold at less than quarter quinine rates, 

 and was a great boon to poor people. In making it the powdered bark was 

 repeatedly macerated in wooden tubs, with a very dilute muriatic acid, for a few 

 days at a time, and the resulting liquors mixed with a solution of caustic soda t 

 precipitate the alkaloids they had dissolved out or the bark. After standing twenty, 

 four hours, the precipitate was collected on filters, purified, dried, and powdered, 

 which completed the operation. 



The third process is the one now in operation in the East. It was started at 

 the Bengal plantations in 1885, and at Madras a year or two later. Now it isbmg 

 adopted by the Dutch in Java. It is a satisfactory process, as it completely 

 exhausts the bark, and h not very expensive to work. The bark is reduced to as 

 almost impalpable powder by means of disintegrators driven at a high speed bjr 

 water turbines. The powder is then mixed with water, caustic soda, and shale- 

 oil ; heated by steam -coils to about 160 degrees Fahrenheit, and kept constantly 

 stirred by machinery for about an hour, when the stirring is stopped and the 

 mixture allowed to rest quietly for an hour or two to let the oil— now comaiwnj 

 the alkaloids— rise clear and bright to the top. The oil is then transferred to 

 another vessel and thoroughly stirred up for a few minutes with sufficient dihrtf 

 sulphuric acid to remove the whole of the alkaloids from it. After separation, by 

 repose, the oil is drawn off for the next batch of bark, and the acidulated liquor, 

 now containing the alkaloids in solution, is heated in steam -jacketed vcaeb, 

 neutralised with a weak solution of caustic soda or ammonia, and set aside to cool 

 and crystallise. To purify the crystals thus obtained they are collected, squcewd, 

 redissolved in boiling water, digested for a few minutes with a little ani iatl W' 

 coal, filtered very hot, and allowed to cool, when the sulphate of quinine cry*alhMi 

 out quite white and clean. 



Distribution of Quinine in India. 



How to get the quinine to the very poorest in the outlying fever districts « 

 Bengal at the lowest possible price, without burdening the public revenues vat 



.r, , , , 1, 1 .~ c;- r*k4rlj»c t lint l ate 



mis purpose. He ordered the quinine to be put up in seaicu pu.»wi* T<r . 

 each, an ordinary dose, by jail labour, and sent to every outlying post 

 Bengal for sale at the low price per packet of one pice, which is the low** » 

 in ordinary circulation in Bengal, and of the value of about one farthing, w 

 only is a stock of these packets kept at all the post offices, but the F^menww 

 visit the outlying hamlets have to carry them in their bags, and sell 

 who may ask for them. The postmasters and postmen get a small co ™™~?fr 

 the sale. A better or cheaper plan of distribution I cannot conceive, » fc 

 Italian Government have paid the Indian Government the compliment 10 wr 

 for part of Italy. ■ : . . ^ ; fl the 

 Sulphate of quinine, quite equal in quality to the very be*t Dranw ^ ^ 

 market, is now turned out by the Government at the Bengal tactop ai , 

 rate of about 1,000 lb. a month. Not many years ago, the annual ^qu im ^ 

 of the Government of Bengal was less than this monthly outpu^ * 

 ■m* ho — ^.,4. l t> 1 nn A r^rhanc more, bo tne uu>» . 



soon be turning out as much as Bengal, and perhaps more, so u 

 can take credit for freely accomplishing the task they set themse [« 



iutfo- 



ducing the cinchonas to India, as I trust I have proved to you without 



ryifigr* 



patience over much. 



Prevention of Potato Scab.-The scab of potatos may, o 



Rural New York'- « * — — -renter! bv soaking the seea 



a 



bsertef 



seed in*!* 0 * 

 tor several years** 1 * 1 



- — v — 1 — — I — * J 



been 



01 corrosive sublimate. This remedy has oeen in ■"^•^ . 

 been so generally successful that there can be no hesitation m 

 as thoroughly reliable. The chief objection to its use is its ir 

 nature. For this reason <rr«ir raution should be used to pre\eni 



reco 

 itensely 



solution 



poisoning the food or drink of any animal, but at the strcngin « fc 

 it may be used to disinfect wounds. The solution should ~ l ^ Top* 

 with metal, hut should be prepared in earthenware or w °^ n god**** 



puuus, in mis solution soaK me \ 7 



then cut and plant. After the seed has been soaked < 

 receptacles in which scabby potatos have been kept, 

 of living year after year in the soil, and, in some cases 



hk 



the seed In all 



grown t 



badly 



water, 

 in that it 



the soil has become » 

 netit is derived fr JJ^J 



as directed will Pf*5£d W 

 infested, Professjr H-Jg 

 ope n furrow J the r» _ 

 i prevented the sca^ i-p 4 

 :ig ht ounces to fift«n 

 !S Tel, and b**fS 



r ^ . t is not poisonous. In purchasing the t0 . r " ia ""' is kept bf 

 formaldehyde gas, which is the name under which formalin 



chemists. 



55 



