152 
Supplement to t e '■'•Tvopical Agyicultuvist: 
[August I, 1890, 
an experiment, and it is advisalde to make 
trials in different localities. The grain is truly 
valuable, is an excellent food for cattle and 
fowls, and makes good bread with wheat flour. 
In India it is often sown as a catch crop 
before the rabi crop of wheat or barley. It is 
seen growing to great perfection, says Prof, 
Wallace, in the neighbourhood of Darjeeling as 
well as in areas of wider extent in the plains. 
Along with amarantas it may now he considered 
the chief food of the hill tribes of the North- 
Western Himalaya. 
Bandaragama. J. A. J. Rodrigo. 
GENERAL ITEMS. 
AVe omitted to mention our good fortune in 
securing a young plant of the Victoria Regia 
which has been placed in a tank in the School of 
Agriculture grounds. 
It is worthy of record that the culms of a giant 
bamboo in the Peradeniya Gardens shot up at an 
astonishing rate in April last year. One of 
these is said to have grown at the rate of 13i 
inches in 24 hours. 
The case of a ruminant man is mentioned in the 
British Medical Journal for May. Dr. Leva of 
Ziirich at a meeting in tliat city exhibited a man 
of 22 who possessed the power of rumination. 
From 5 to 30 minutes after each meal the ingested 
food continued to rise up into the patient’s mouth, 
to he masticated and swallowed again and again, 
the lad relishing the cuds all through. The pro- 
cess lastsfrom 70 to OOminutes. The patient hasno 
control over the process. A careful examination of 
the pharynx, gullet, and stomach failed to reveal 
anything abnormal. He states that rumination 
first appeared about 6 years before_ his coming 
under observation, when he had been in the service 
of a very stingy master. The meals being scarce 
and the'lad’s appetite very keen, he acquired the 
liabit of swallowing again the morsels of food 
which came up into his mouth ! 
The New B. 1. steamer Alaska is, according to 
the Indian Ar/riculturist, to be specially employed 
in providing steam communication between 
Negamtam and Colombo— the duration of the 
voyacre during which 4 or 5 intermediate ports 
will be ’touched at, being about a day and a half. ■ 
The rn-incipal trade will he in rice. For coolie 
emigrants from Indian ports to Colombo the 
charge will be R4 per head, from Ceylon ports R2 
and under. 
The trade in ground-nuts is reaching enormous 
proportions. The estimated value of the ground- 
nut export during 1889 in India was 122 lakhs of 
ruijees, of which 99 ])er cent was produced m 
IJrilish India. 
Professor Wallace has brought out a revised 
(.(liUonof his “lave Stock of the Farm,” and is 
now engamal on another work on the Rural 
Feonomy of Australia and N(uv Zealand, which 
will ver'ysliorlly apjieiir. 
\Incl) curiosity was aroused at t.he Nawalapitiya 
llailwny -tatimi during tlie latter end of xVIay over 
a tree which had been cut down to some 3 or 4 feet 
from the ground, from the exposed section of the 
stem of which there was a continual drip of 
water. The tree in question was, if we are not 
mistaken, a Thunberr/ia creeper, with a stem not 
more than 2 or 3 inches in diameter. According 
to the Station-master, the dripping had been 
going on for a fortnight, and showed no signs of 
ceasing. 
A curious case was reported from ilutwal the 
other day. It seems that a hull commenced 
bleeding most xirofusely, and that the blood 
which issued from the region of the iienis con- 
tinued to flow for more than 24 hours, despite all 
the efforts of the local A^ederalas to stoj) itbycoxiious 
draughts. The case coming under the notice of 
a Medical gentleman in the neighbonrhood, he, 
instantly guessing at the cause of the hemorrhage, 
syringed a strong solution of salt into the sheath of 
the penis, when the bleeding almost immediately 
ceased. The/ows malt, as may he inferred, was a 
leech. 
The iSwanley Horticultural College has for its 
main object the encouragement and improvement 
of fruit farming in Great Britain. The principal 
of this institution is Prof. Frank Cheshire, and 
among the lecturers is Mr. Cecil Hooper, f.h.a.s., 
who was a student both at Cirencester and Edin- 
burgh. Mr. Hooper has just written a very able 
paiier on Fruit Farming, the possibility of its 
extension, and the remuneration to be derived 
from it, which apjiears in the last number of the 
Highland and Agricultural Society’s transactions. 
The Swanley College has an experimental garden 
of 43 acres attached to it. 
It is reported by a correspondent in the Field 
that at luveradoch, Doone, on the 24th May, a 
single egg produced two pheasants. 
A copy of the Bosjthore Fgyptien to hand gives 
a sketch of the plan upon which the Agricultural 
Department and College about to be founded in 
Egypt are to be established. Air. Wnlliamson 
AV allace, the Director, is actively engaged in mak- 
ing himself acquainted with the needs of the 
country and the means of improvement to be 
adopted. In a chatty letter received from him 
from Cairo he says, “ I have a lot of hard work — 
lip early in the morning, and off to see the agri- 
culture of the country. The Government have 
given me a house-boat in which I go about all 
through Egypt, and have a look at eveiy thing.” 
The local Governments of India have been 
asked to send delegates to an Agricultural Con- 
ference pro]iosed to be held at Simla in October 
this A’'ear, before the return of Dr. A^oelcker to 
England. 
The mummified cats exhumed from an ancient 
cemetery not far from Cairo — some 20 tons — have, 
it is said, been brought over to England with the 
intention of selling them for manure. 
Solentropism is the jiroposed name for the 
phenomenon of plants turning towards the moon. 
M. Musset has made careful observations on 
this subject, and concludes that l lie .stems even 
