filMCES — PEPPER. *l 



ing to renew the cultivation. There is abundant 

 scope for this purpose on both sides of the harbour, 

 and every facility is at hand for carrying it on. 



The pepper plant, or vine, requires a good soil, the 

 richer the better, but the red soil of the higher hills is 

 not congenial, the Chinese think, to it. The undulati- 

 ons skirting the bases of the hills, and the deep alluvial 

 landa, where not saturated with water, or liable to bo 

 overflowed, are preferred. 



The Chinese have always been the chief cultivators, 

 and when the speculation flourished, they received ad- 

 vances from the merchants, which they paid back in 

 produce at fixed rates. 



The plants are set out at intervals, every waif, of 

 from seven to twelve feet, according to the degree of 

 fertility of the soil, so that there are from 800 to 1,000 

 vines in one orlong of land; to each vine is allotted a 

 prop of from ten to thirteen feet high, cut from the 

 thorny tree called diddap, or where that is scarce, 

 from the less durable boonghti ; these props take root, 

 thus affording both shade and support to the plant. 

 The plants may be raised from seed pepper, but 

 tliis plan is not approved of, cuttings being prefera- 

 ble, as they soonest come into bearing. The pits in 

 which these cuttings are set, should be a foot and a 

 half square and two feet in depth ; manure is not 

 often applied, and then it is only some turf ashes. 

 However unpieturesque a pepper plantation may 

 be, still its neat and uniform appearance, renders the 

 landscape Hvely, and there can be little doubt, that 

 the Island has suffered in its salubrity since the 

 jungle usurped the extensive tracts formerly un- 

 der pepper cultivation. 



When the vine has reached the height of three or 



four feet, it is bent down and laid in the earth, and 



about five of the strongest shoots which now spring 



F 



L*oO 1*} 



