200 



ORIENTAL COMMERCE. 



[ Ceylon 



into the earth, and spread to a considerable distance. Many of them smell 

 strongly of camphire, which is sometimes extracted from them, 



The blossoms grow on slender foot-stalks, of a pale yellow colour, from 

 the axilla? of the leaves, and the extremity of the branches. They are 

 numerous clusters of small white flowers, having a brownish tinge in the 

 centre, about the same size as the lilac, which it resembles. The flower is 

 monopetalous, stellated into six points, has nine stamina, and one stile. It 

 produces a fruit of the form of an acorn, in taste resembling the olive, and 

 when dry, it becomes a thin shell, containing an oval kernel about the size 

 of the seed of an apple. The smell of the blossom is not strong, but ex- 

 tremely pleasant, resembling a mixture of the rose and lilac. The fruit, 

 when boiled in water, yields an oil which floats at the top, and answers for 

 burning in lamps. When allowed to congeal, it becomes of a solid substance 

 like w ax, and is formed into candles. The smell of it is much more agree- 

 able than that of coco-nut oil ; but it is only used for these purposes in the 

 interior of the island. 



The appearance of this tree strongly resembles that of the Launis 

 Cassia, and the bark of the old wood possesses the same qualities. The 

 cinnamon of Ceylon, however, is greatly improved by cultivation ; and that 

 which is most highly prized, is stripped from shoots of young trees. 



The trees which are planted for the purpose of obtaining cinnamon, 

 shoot out a great number of branches apparently from the same root, and 

 are not permitted to rise above the height often feet. Those sprouts which 

 are cut down to be barked, are of the thickness of a common walking-stick, 

 and yield an incomparably fine cinnamon bark ; and from these shoots come 

 the sticks, which in appearance resemble those from the hazel-tree, but of 

 which the bark has a cinnamon smell when rubbed. Cinnamon is barked 

 in the woods at two different seasons of the year : the first is termed the 

 grand harvest, and lasts from April to August ; the second is the small 

 harvest, and lasts from November to January. The barking is performed 

 in the following manner s — A good cinnamon-tree is looked out for, and 

 chosen by the leaves, and other characteristics. Those branches which are 

 three years old, are lopped off with a common crooked pruning knife, from 

 which the outside pellicle of the bark is scraped off; the twigs are then 

 ripped up long ways with the point of a knife, and the bark gradually 

 loosened till it can be entirely taken off. The smaller tubes or quills of it 

 are inserted into the larger, and thus spread out to dry, when the bark rolls 

 itself up still closer together, and is then tied into bundles, and finally 

 carried off: each bundle is then bound round with rattans, and packed up, 

 alter having previously undergone an examination by tasting and chewing, 



