4 o6 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [January 2 , 1888. 
436 Washington Avenue, Macon, Georgia, U.S.A., 
Aug. 24th, 1887. 
My dear friend, — I thought I would write you a 
few lines this morning to tell you about the yams. 
I am astonished to see how well they are growing. 
They are all alive except one very small one. The vine 
from the largest yam has grown about three feet in the 
last four days, and everybody is astonished to see it. 
You say that No. 5 has fruit on the vine as well as 
in the ground. When you write next please be sure 
to tell me if the fruit that grows on the vine is used 
for food. Please tell me also if all these different 
varieties of potatoes that you sent are used for food. 
CEYLON TEA AT THE MELBOUBNE 
EXHIBITION. 
Yandrit, Viotoria, Australia, 16th Nov. 1887. 
Sir,— Kindly allow me space in your valuable 
paper to give the Ceylon tea planters a hint re 
the Melbourne Exhibition. I take it for granted 
that they purpose being represented and would 
suggest that if possible their acoredited represent- 
ative bring a native or Tamil to serve at the tea 
stall, a tidy smart boy. 
I may mention that I received a box of your 
tea, and as " the proof of the tea is the drinking 
of it," I fraDkly confess that at first I did not like 
the flavour, to me it tasted as if sweetened with 
brown or ration sugar. But before I had finished 
the cup I pronounced it the best tea that 
ever, I had tasted in my life. It seem- 
ed to have a body in it, and one felt that 
it was doing one good, just such a difference as 
one feels when partaking of a good glass of port 
wine beside the logwood rubbish that is often sold 
for port. 
I gave away several pounds of the tea, and all 
my friends soon came to like it and eagerly asked 
for more. Your tea is very different from what is 
sold here as Indian tea by the Caloutta 8yndicate,and 
my advice to your agent is bring a good supply of 
good tea and you will soon find a market. Let 
the agent employ a reliable person to distribute 
samples in such places in Melbourne, as the police 
stations, the soldiers' barracks, and so forth, and 
best of all through the bush in the rural districts 
and townships, not at the stores, but amongst the 
people at their homes. 
I may be wrong, but I think, the time is not 
far distant when you will be reoeiving large sup- 
plies of our butter (which we are now selling at 
6d per lb.) and cheese, and in return we can take 
supplies of tea, cocoa, fibre and other products 
of your lovely island. 
I shall only add that I feel so confident of your 
ultimate success that I will gladly render any 
assistance in my power to your representative, and 
should you require an agent in Melbourne, I could 
not name a better than the Hon. James Balfour, 
if he would undertake it. 
I enclose my name and address for references 
if required. — Yours, &c. 
A LOVEB OF CEYLON TEA. 
CINCHONA AND QUININE. 
London, 30th November 1887. 
Dear Sir,— I wrote you last on this subject on 
2'ith October. I told you then I thought the cin- 
chona had touched bottom, but I hardly expected 
the market would so soon take a turn for the better. 
The auction of bark held on 22nd instant, 
showed an advance of nearly 20 per cent from the 
lowest paint touched. The next auctions will be 
on 6th proximo, the advance will bring out a larger 
quantity of South American, which has been held 
for some time, also some 3,000 bales Java— cood 
I hope it will be all sold, the quicker the present 
stocks get taken off the market the better for Ceylon 
Quinine has made a considerable advance also. Oii 
27th October German was offered out of second 
hands at Is 3£d. No buyers. Last week 130,000 oz 
changed hands at Is 4d to Is 6d, while yesterday 
and today a large business has been done at Is 7d 
to Is 9d. Market strong. 
The sole cause of this rise has been the falling-off 
of exports from Ceylon,— nothing else. Ceylon has 
the regulating of the price of bark in her own 
hands; and I trust therefore the holders of bark 
will keep back their supplies ; by doing this they will 
be amply rewarded in the future. The market is a 
very sensitive one, and if shippers press forward 
shipments, we will relapse into former low rates. 
Those interested need not fear Java or Indian 
exports. They no more affect the market, than Ceylon 
coffee does the coffee market. 
The "boom" is sure to come if planters will 
only keep back supplies. This cannot be impressed 
too strongly on them.— Yours truly, 
E. T. DELMEGE. 
Since writing above, market closes firm at Is lOd 
for German quinine. 
Cubebs.— At the drug sales this month some ex- 
cellent samples of genuine cubebs were on show 
accompanied by others of a pale colour, not unlike 
that of "yellow berries," and which evidently con- 
sisted of the unripe fruit. Both the ripe and the 
unripe berries gave the beautiful carmine rose colour 
with concentrated sulphuric acid, characteristic of 
the genuine drug, but the unripe ones, when bruised 
and boiled in water, did not give the deep blue color- 
auon with tincture of iodine, although it was readily 
obtained with the ripe berries. The unripe ber.ies 
possessed however, a considerable amount of aroma 
and would doubtless yield essential oil on distillation' 
It would be interesting to know whether this aosence 
of co our on the addition of iodine to the decoction 
of the unripe fruit is due to the presence of a com- 
pound analogous to glycosuccinic acid, which accorrlire 
to Messrs. Brunner and Ohuard (Ph arm. Journ , [31 
xvi., 917) occurs in unripe fruits, and forms with 
iodine a soluble and colourless compound Pharm- 
aceutical Journal. 
Patchouli Leaves.— Mr. J. E. Jackson, the Cura- 
tor of the Kew Museum, remarks (Gard. Citron. 
Nov. 19, p. 617) concerning a sample of patchouli' 
leaves lately received from Penaug, as the r-.sult of 
an experimental trial in cultivating and harvesting the 
plant, that one sample consisted of the leaves of 
Urena lobata, var. sinuata, which it seems is largely 
used to adulterate patchouli for the market Mr 
Jackson also points out that Pogostemon 'mam' 
Tenore {Kew Joum. Bot., 1847, p. 328, 1. 11, exel svn )' 
and Plectranthu.i Patchouli, Clarke (' Flora of British 
India,' p. 624), have the same odour. Selected leaves 
were reported by a firm of manufacturing chemists 
to be worth £80 lo £100 per ton, and the demand 
tor the leaves and essential oil rfs being steady and 
continuous. The leaves of Urena Mmto (of which 
there is a specimen in the Herbarium of the Pharm- 
aceutical Society) bear a strong resemblance to the 
second form of adulteration of patchouli leaves figured 
by Dr. Pasehkis (Pharm, Journ., [3], xi., p. 814, fig 
4), and agree with the latter in the presence of 
stellate hairs. Dr. Paschki-, however, does not men- 
tion the oval slit gland which is characteristic of the 
leaves of Urena lukitu, and may be found near the 
base of the central nerve at the back of the leaf. 
In true patchouli the hairs of the leaves are all 
simple and four-celled.— Pharmaceutical Journal. 
