3?S 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [December i, 1889. 
(From the " Family Doctor.") 
THE IVOEY PLANT. 
So different are the products of the animal from 
those of the vegetable kingdom that even the most 
careless observer may be expected to distinguish them. 
Yet multitudes are in the daily use of ivory buttons, 
boxes, and small ornaments who never doubt that they 
are made from the tusks of the elephant, while they 
are really the product of a plant. The ivory plant 
is a native of the northern regions of South America, 
extending northward just across the isthmuz of 
Panama ; large groves of it have been recently dis- 
covered in the provinoe of that name. 
It is found in ex tensive groves — in which it banishes 
all other vegeta* ; i from the soil it has taken pos- 
session of— or : uttered among the large trees of the 
virgin forests. It has the appearance of a stemless 
palm, and consists of a graceful crown of leaves, twenty 
feet long, of a delicate pale green colour, and divided 
like the plume of a feather into from thirty to fifty 
pairs of long, narrow leaflets. It is not however, 
really stemless, but the weight of the foliage and the 
fruit is too much for the comparatively slender trunk, 
and consequently pulls it down to the ground, where 
it is seen likeja large exposed root, stretching for a 
length of nearly twenty feet in the old plants. The 
long leaves are employed by Indians to cover the 
roofs of their cottages. 
Each flower of the ivory plant does not contain 
stamens and pistils, as in most of the British plants, 
but, like our willows, one tree produces only staminal 
flowers, while another has only pistillate ones. Such 
plants are said by botanists to be dioecious. Both 
kinds of the plants of the vegetable ivory have the 
same general appearance, and differ only in the form 
and arrangement of the flowers. In the one kind an 
innumerable quantity of staminal flowers is borne on 
a cylindrical fleshy axis four feet long, while in the 
other a few pistillate flowers spring from the ends 
of the flower stalk, Each plant bears several heads 
of flowers. 
Purdie, who visited the plants in their native locality 
in 1846, says : "The fragrance of the flower is most 
powerful and delicious beyond that of any other plant, 
and so diffusive that the air for many yards around 
was alive with myriads of annoying insects, which first 
attracted my notice. I had afterwards to carry the 
flowers in my hands for twelve miles, and though I 
killed a number of insects that followed me, the next 
day a great many still hovered about them which had 
come along with us from the wood where the plant 
grew. The group of pistillate flowers produce a roundish 
fruit from eight to twelve inches in diameter, and 
weighing when ripe about twenty-five pounds. It is 
oovered by a hard woody coat everywhere embossed 
with conical angular tubercles, and is composed of six 
or seven portions, each containing from six to nine 
seeds. Those seeds when ripe are pure white, free 
from veins, dots, or vessels of any kind, presenting a 
perfect uniformity of texture surpassing the finest 
animal ivory ; and its substance is throughout so hard 
that the slightest streaks from the turning lathe are 
observable. Indeed, it looks much more like an animal 
than a vegetable product ; but a close comparison will 
enable one to distinguish it from the ivory of the ele- 
phant by its brightness and its fatty appearance, but 
chiefly by its minute cellular structure. This curious 
hard material is the store of food laid up by the plant 
for the nourishment of the embryo, or young plant con- 
tained in the seed. It corresponds to the white of an 
egg of the hen, and has been consequently called the 
albumen of the seed. In its early condition the ivory 
exists as a clear, insipid fluid, with which travellers 
allay their thirst. Afterwards the liquor becomes 
sweet and milky, and in this state it is greedily devoured 
by bears, hogs and turkeys. It then gradually becomes 
hard. It is very curious that this hard mass again re- 
turns to its former soft state in the process of germi- 
nation. 
" The young plant for some time is dependent upon 
it for its food, and if the seed be taken out of the ground 
after the plant baa appeared it will be found to be 
filled with a substance half pulp and half milk, on which 
the plant lives until it is old enough to obtain its food 
on its own account. From the small size of the seed 
the largest not being more than two inches across its 
greatest diameter, the vegetable ivory can be employed 
in the manufacture of only small articles, such as 
beads, buttons, toys, &c. What is wanting in size is, 
however, often made up by the skill and ingenuity of 
the workmen, who join together several pieces so as to 
make a long object, when it is easy to hide the joints 
from view, or make a lid from one seed, and the box 
from another." 
We do not know if a specimen of tnis plant has 
ever reached this country, or whether vegetable ivory 
is a product made use of by the British cabinet maker, 
but we cannot for a moment be in doubt as to the 
beauty of the material in question — albeit, the small- 
ness of the seed is much against its being generally 
used. 
COFFEE PLANTING IN JAMAICA. 
The following extract from the letter of a planter, 
dated Oct. 25th, 1888, got mislaid, but is still worth 
printing : — 
Orop6 this end of the island (Carpenter's Mountain 
Range) are very poor, owing to the long drought from 
November 1887 to April 1888. I have an idea that a 
drought of moderate length would always do us good 
but it doesn't suit this district of the island, to have 
a dry March, the April and May bloNSoms in dry 
years give us all our crops ; but later blossoms, June 
and even July (a universally late one) are no good 
as we have to strip the trees about the end of January 
or early in February. This year we have had an ex- 
traordinary spring on the tr ees : my bearing fields have 
made more wood than I have ever seen, and it is hard 
to believe they gave such good crops for the last four 
years as they have given, viz., 80 tierces 55 tierces 53 
tierces and 74 tierces each 850 lb. nett, but this year 
comes a drop, I don't expect more than 25 tierces but 
have great hopes of the ''Planter's Year" (i.e., next.) 
I think I told you some time since that our method of 
establishing a field is to give out the woodland to the 
natives free of rent for three years, binding them to 
cut down, burn and clean up and get ready for lin- 
ing and pegging ; then after the pegging is done they 
are at liberty to plant certain provisions between the 
pegs, and after the planting they are to keep the 
young plants free from weeds in consideration of 
their getting the land rent free. The land is gener- 
ally cut down and burned up in March and the peg- 
ging done immediately. I never plant till September 
as I find there is a much better chance for the plants 
to be established during the cool winter months, than 
if planted in April and May, as very often after the 
May rains are over, the hot sun of July, August and 
part of September is enough to burn the plants out 
of the ground. 
I have now planted just over one hundred acres in 
three years, and am glad to say the first planting 
nearly 60 acres is looking in excellent order, and this 
year gave me a small picking (two years old) and next 
orop I expect a fair picking. When my new plants 
are all in bearing I shall have three hundred acres of 
bearing coffee ; but in the meantime I am still going 
on with the planting as I " have my doubts " as to 
the increase of coffee production in Brazil, now they 
have emancipated the slaves. 
You will never get West Indians to believe that 
emancipation increases production : it is a lovely theory 
and should for the sake of the Exeter Hall party prove 
the case; but "our friend and brother " isn't ambi- 
toius, he doesn't care to provide for a rainy day, he 
has no wants that a shilling or two cannot obtain, 
and after the effort of labor to obtain the necessary 
shilling or two he lapses into the condition of the 
" honest British labourer," i. e., " he 'ates work and 'ates 
them as likes it " till his desire for some other 
luxury (in the West Indies no native works or haa 
need to work for bare necessaries) causes him to turn 
out, I give you an example of the typical Jamaica 
