456 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [Jan. i, .895. 
JELLY-MAKING PLANTS. 
The peculiar mucilage just noticed iu the taste 
improvers recalls the presence of a somewhat similar, 
but not an identical substauen in Otbi r plants 
There is pectoeo or a gummv 6ubstance found in 
the seeds of qu nee, but more familiar to us iu the I 
linseed. It is also present in 1 i pe fruit', and it j 
imparts do their juice the property of gelatin sing 
when cooked. In Ceylon there ia a plant calUu 
Kessi-piasan, which holds mucilage or pectose in 
its leaves. I was inuch struck with an experiment 
made with this plant soon after my a: rival in the 
island. A fr cud took same Raver snd cru 
them in water. Within a few miuutes the . 
was so thoroughly gelatinise I that it could Lie taken 
up in the hand and thrown about lik ; a compact 
mass of jelly. This imp'essed me at the time as 
very remarkable. A'ter describing the Para- para, 
of New Zealand, which may very we' I be called 
the bird-lime tree, wh ch captures birds by its 
viscid fruits, the lecturer proceeded: — In Jamaica 
I described many years Mgo a grass-like plant, a 
BIRD-CATCHING SEDGE, 
that posiessed the most effectual apparatus for the 
purpose. Hire is a slender plaut. not mare than 
eightheen inch, s high, with narro v grass-like h 
The flower heads droop over ths streams and rivulet a 
Dear which it prows. If cartftilly examined it 
will be noticed that tach fljret is furi ished with 
a highly specialised br si le attached to the hi eif 
the fruit. The upper part i< fu'ms ed with a wonder- 
fully formed hook, so elastic and tenacious that once 
it takes hold it cannot be teuioved, except by c .Try- 
ing away the fruit attached to it. The object of 
the hook is no donbt to secure the distribut on of 
the fruit. If a large bird or animal passes with iu 
reach the hooks immediately attach themselves to 
it, and the fruits are earned to fre.-m localities. It, 
however, the bi'd is small it is uuable to cetach 
the hooks from the plant, and it ii effectually 
caught. The object or the plaat iu th s case is 
def- ated, and the bird dies. I saw several Bmaii 
birds (" grass-qnits ") caught by this Jamaica scd^c, 
and released them by my own hands. The plaut 
is abundant in mountaiu plac sin the Wes. Indies 
or Central or South America, just in the liue of 
flight of migratory biris pisdu^ north and sout'i. 
The hooks evidently do tneir work mo^t effectually 
in assisting to distribute the seeds. Catching the 
small birds must be regarded a9 the result of accident 
rather than design, for the plaut docs not profit by it. 
While preparing notes for the la-esent address, by 
a strange coincidence, there were sent to Kew s.me 
MEXICAN JUMPING BEANS, 
about which I had already gathered some information. 
These beans may already bo familiar to some of 
yon here. There are, however, several new lac s 
conneoted with them of considerable interest. The 
beans are obtained from one pl.ee in Mexico only. 
They have been found nowhere else. A traveller 
arrived at Southhampt on bringiug what he considered 
to be a great cuivsiy, and up n which be set 
a very high price, name y, some jump ng crnio-.ug 
seeds, obatined from the coast ot the Pacific. 
They' had excited t-reai. in erest among the 1 assengeis 
of the st. amer, and many a vv ary hour had, no 
doubt, been lightened oy witnessing their gambols 
and speculating on the cause of u.eiaon Sometimes 
the moiicn was continued (always in jerk ) for Suine 
minutes, somet.mes one or otier ted woud lcinaiu 
quiet lor a tew seconds or minutes, or even for haif- 
an-hour. If the shell is carefully laid open .he 
cause of all ihe movements and strange contortius 
iasdtnina fine fat little maggot caremlly housed 
inside the seid. The lecturer also described some 
oddities of p*lms and some curious examples of what 
may be described as the survival of tne fittest in 
plant life, whered a seedling growing oat ef a Brazil 
Lut deebrately eats up its fellows in order to 
perpetual the sp.cies.-At tue close on the moiiun 
of Mr. Wakfield, secouded by Mr. Miller, a most 
cordia. v te <•( ttiai-ks was pas ed to Dr. Mom-, 
lor his ordinal and moss interesting lecture— Thames 
Valley Times, Nov. 7. 
MAURITIUS. 
Port-Louis, Nov. 11. 
Tue Weatheb and THE Chop. — The weather being 
very favourable for the nianfacture of sugar, the 
crop is being pushed on fast as possible and will pro- 
bably be finished by the end of next month. The 
yield has generally improved a littne since last month, 
but the reports we have received from the different 
districts does not allow us to modify our opinion on 
the perceptible deficit which we have already men- 
tioned. 
Aloe Fibres. — Tiie market is firm. We have to 
quote the sale of ltit) bales good to first qualities at 
R240 per ton. 
Vanilla. — The market is firm. — We confirm our 
last valuation as regards the outturn of the coming 
crop which will not exceed 1,<X>U kilos. 
Wc quote nominally : — 
1st quality . . " R23 to 24 per kilo 
2nd do .. 19 to '20 do. 
Good to Middling H to 15 do. 
(Above 6 inches) 
Vanillons . . B to 9 do. 
— Merchants' it Planters' Gazette. 
PLANTING AND PRODUCE. 
The Incbeased Demand fob Tea, Coffee, and 
Cocoa. — No one is likely to dispute the opinion put 
forward iu the columns" of the Daily Telegraph, that 
the mo3t practical promoters of temperance are those 
wbo have started and who manage the cheap and 
good tea, coffee, and cocoa shops which now abound 
in 1/oudon and elsewhere. As the writer in the 
authority we have quoted points out, a generation 
since it was almost impossible for the working-man, 
and above all the working-woman, to obtain a cup of 
coffee or tea save at houses which were often of more 
than equivocal reputation, while today it is difficult 
to find any part of the metropolis destitute of 
cheap, well-conducted, and, as a rule, fairly clean 
establishi.ients. Apropos of this a comparison is drawn 
between the old times and the new. '• The first coffee 
house in London was opened in George Yard, Lorn 
bard Street, in the year 1652, by a Greek named 
Pasquet, or Pascal, who had come to England as the 
servant of Mr. Edwards, an English Turkey merchant. 
The flagrant berry, or rather the roasted seed there- 
of, was at the outest looked upon with considerable 
disfavour by the Government of the Protectorate, 
and five years after the Greek Pasquet opened hii 
house the Rainbow Coffee House, Temple Bar, wae 
presented as a nuisance by the Grand Jury. Again, 
in 1G75, coffee-houses were suppressed by Royal pro- 
clamation, the motive for their prohibition being that 
the frequenters of these establishments were too 
much addicted to talking politics. The proclama- 
tion was speedily rescinded, and throughout the 
eighteenth century and during the first decade of 
the present one the London coffee-houses flourished 
exceedingly. It was, of course, practicable to obtain 
a bowl of coffee or a dish of tea at these houses of 
entertainment ; but, as a rule, the old historic coffee- 
houses, such as The London Jonathan's Garraway'e, 
Mutton's, Dick's, Sam's Betty's, and so forth, were 
taverns which did a much larger business in excisable 
liquors than in the cups which cheer but not 
inebriate. For the rest, tea, coffee, and chocolate 
where altogether patrician beverages, and cocoa waa 
whelly unknown, while the high prices of tea and 
coffee placed those wholesome and harmless drinks 
altogether beyond the reach of the poor. — H. Sf C. Mail, 
Nov. 23. 
The Pbospects of the Paddy Cp.op in Lower Burma 
are the reverse of improving, and it is expected that 
the retail price of rice will rise sixty per cent, a few 
months hence, causing considerable distress. Already 
the Burmese complain of the hardness of the times. 
— M. Mail, 
