August i, 1889.] THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST. 
95 
be worth while to grow sufficient leaves to meet the 
local demand for Cocaine; beyond this it is scarcely 
possible to go, if it is borne in mind that South 
America is able, without further extension of cultiva- 
tion to produce such euormous quantities of Coca 
leaves, that the one-eightieth part would be sufficient 
to 6wamp the Cocaine markets of the whole world. 
The commercial value in London o£ Coca leaves 
varied from 10s. to Is. 6d. per pound last year. 
The attention of this Society was directed to Coca 
in the years 1885 and 1886, and plants having been 
successfully propagated from a. single specimen in 
the Experimental Garden, were widely distributed 
among planters. Small plants are uovv available. In 
the year 1885, Surgeon-Geueral Bidie, c I e, a member 
of the Committee, published in pamphlet form a 
leoture that he had delivered on " Coca, its source, 
culture, and uses," which threw a flood of light on 
the whole subject. Quite recently the Board of Re- 
venue instructed the Society to send 100 plants to 
Ganjam, 50 plants to Vizagapatam, 60 plants to 
Ouddapah, 40 plants to North Arcot, and 50 plants 
to Tinnevelly. 
♦ 
VANILLA. 
Read an abstract in The Times of 28th 
January, 188&, of a recent roport by the United 
States Consul at Bordeaux on the Vanilla trade at that 
port. One of the most interesting and delicate arti- 
cles of trade in the Bordeaux market is vanilla, which 
is imported from the coast of Vera Cruz, the west 
slopes of the Cordilleras, Java, Mauritius, Tahiti, the 
West Indies, and other places. Vanilla belongs to the 
orchid family, and is a sarmentose plant, furnished 
with thick, oblong, glaucous green leaves. The vine 
sometimes, attains a height of 45ft. It begins to 
bear the third year after plauting and continues 
bearing 30 years. Bach vine annually produces from 
40 to 55 capsules or seed pods, which are gathered 
before reaching complete maturity between April and 
June. For one method of preparation they are ga- 
thered after they have lost their green tint, and 
are then exposed to the sun in wollen sheets which 
have previously been throughly heated. They are 
then put into boxes covered with a cloth, and are 
again heated in the sun, 12 to 15 hours, after which 
they should assume a coffee colour. If this is not 
obtained, they must again be covered and again 
exposed, the whole process lasting about two months, 
after which they are packed securely, 50 each, in 
tin boxes. By the second method about a thousand 
pods are tied together, and plunged into boiling water 
to bleach them, after which they are exposed to the 
sun, and then coated with oil or wrapped in oiled 
cotton to prevent them from bursting. During the 
dryiDg process the pods exudes a sticky liquid, which 
is expedited by gentle pressure two or three times 
a day. By this process the pod loses about a quarter 
of its original size. The best quality pods are seven 
to nine inches in length, and large in proportion, 
and possess in great abundance the characteristic 
and agreeable perfume which gives vanilla its value. 
The vine is sometimes covered with a silvery efflores- 
cence producing an essential salt similar to that 
found in the pod, and this is diffused on the outside 
of the capsule. It is called vanilla rime, and is in 
great demand in the Bordeaux market. Vanilla is 
used in perfumery, and iu flavouring confectionery 
and cordials. It is supposed to possess powers similar 
to valerian, while it is much more grateful. Its pro- 
duction iu Reunion has increased in the past 40 years 
from a few pounds to nearly half a million, and that 
colony is now the principal rival and competitor of 
Mexico. Tne total import into France rose from 
about 200,000 pounds in 1S80 to about 260,000 in 1886 
but the annual import fluctuates considerably — 
Proceedings of the A.-H. Society of Madras. 
+ : 
THE SCHOOL OF FORESTRY AT DEHRA 
DOON, INDIA. 
Last year we gave an account of the newlv-established 
School of Forestry at Cooper's Hill, the' first of the 
kind in the United Kingdom, and explained what 
kind of instruction was there given, and how it was 
suited to the training of officers for the Indian Fores 
Department. We now propose to say something of 
its brother in Iudia — an elder brother, indeed, by some 
eight years — the School at Dehra Doon, iu the North- 
Western Provinces, now engaged in the education of 
those who may, not inaptly, be called the non- 
commissioned officers of the Department. The Dehra 
Doon is a long valley, which lies at the foot of that 
portion of the Himalaya which stretches between the 
great rivers Jumna and Ganges. It is shut off from 
the great Gangetic plain by a range of hills called 
the " Siwaliks," known well to all students of palaeouto- 
logical geology as the range in which were found the 
wonderful series of bones of extinct mammals des- 
cribed by Messrs. Falconer and Cautley. The valh-y 
itself lies about 2,000 feet above the level of the sea, 
possesses a beautiful climate free from the blasts of 
the hot winds which, in April to June, sweep over 
the plains to the south of it; and is further known 
historically as having been trie site of the first ex- 
periments made by the Indian Government in grow- 
ing the tea-plant, experiments which proved its suit 
ability to India, and made the Doon the fatherland 
of the great Indian tea industry — an industry which 
has gradually increased to such an extent that the 
exports of tea from Iudia and Ceylon now very nifarly 
rival in amount those from the Chinese Empire. 
Centrally situated in this beautiful valley, among 
plantations of tea, forests of sal-wood, and groves 
where the deodar of the Himalaya may be seen along- 
side of the mango, typical of the Indian plains, and 
feathery bamboos raise their heads from an under- 
growth" in which wild or semi- wild roses thrive with 
luxuriance, lies the town of Dehra Doon, the head- 
quarters of a Deputy-Commissioner, of the offices of 
the great Trigonometrical Survey of India, of a regi- 
ment of Ghoorka troops, and of the body-guard of 
the Viceroy. It is rather a straggling town, like 
most similar Indian stations; but, centrally situated 
and surrounded by gardens, is found the Forest School, 
of which we wish to convey some idea to our readers. 
The School was first started, in 1878, by the exertions 
of the then Inspector-General of Forests, now Sir 
Dietrich Brandis, K.C.I.E., and the first Director was 
Lieut.-Colonel F. Bailey, of the Royal Engineers. 
At present the Director is Mr. W. R. Fisher, b. a. 
of Cambridge University, who is assisted by a Pro- 
fessor of Forestry, Mr. E. E. Fernandez, and a Pro- 
fessor of Geology and Chemistry, Dr. H. Warth. 
Mr. Fisher himself lectures on forest botauy, while 
other officers, attached to the School for the manage- 
ment of the adjacent forests, teach mathematics, 
forest law, forest entomology, and surveying, the 
teaching of the last-named subject being especially 
fostered by the presence, in the same buildiug, of the 
office of the Forest Survey, which is now engaged 
in the preparation of careful detailed maps of the 
great forest estate which Government possesses in 
India, and which bids fair to become, not only by its 
agricultural and climatic effects, but by its financial 
success, one of the most valuable of the revenue- 
yielding departments of the Empire. 
Attached to the School is a well-equipped museum, 
containing a magnificent collection of accurately-named 
Indian woods; an herbarium, a chemical laboratory, 
and a meteorological observatory; while the forests 
of three districts are attached to the School as a 
training-ground, in which the young students may 
learn, by personal and actual experience, the conduct 
of forest operations in the field. The students are 
usually selected in the different provinces by the Con- 
servators of Forests, and are generally youug officers 
who have seen already some preliminary service. 
Several have been deputed by the chief native 
States, such as Mysore and Baroda, and this shows 
the spread that an enlightened forest policy is making 
in the country. There, are, besides, a number of 
independent students, who study in the hope of ob- 
taining appointments if successful, either iu the British 
territory or in the native States. 
The courses of study are carried. on at the School, 
the higher in English, leading up to the ranger's 
oertifioate, whioh qualifies the students who succeed 
