March.] THE NURSERY. 287 
being removed, each sheet is taken up by itself, and the operation 
is finished." 
The preceding is the process employed by the Japanese, and 
whether we regard the expedition or labour, or the quantity and 
quality of the product, it seems to admit of much improvement. 
Instead of reducing the subject to a pulp by battons, in the man- 
ner above described, that might be done more effectually by grind- 
ing it, in the way practised with rags. 
The colour might be rendered as elegantly white as that of any 
other substance, by means of an immersion, first in oxygenated 
muriatic acid, afterwards in a solution of alkali, and finally, wash- 
ing it in pure water. By these means it is probable that the por- 
tions thrown aside for paper of inferior qualities, might be wrought 
into that of prime excellence. 
The decoction of rice and of the root of Manihot, can have no 
possible advantage over the size commonly used for giving to the 
paper the necessary firmness and texture. 
The Calabrian or Manna Jish. 
There are two particular species of ash, from which that useful 
drug called manna is collected in the kingdom of Naples, &c,,and 
which might be cultivated in the southern states to advantage^ 
therefore I am induced to give some account of them. 
1. The Fraxinus ornus, or flowering ash, which is the principal 
kind cultivated for manna. The leaflets are ovate-oblong, serrate, 
petioledj flowers with petals. 
2. The Fraxinus rotundifolia, or round-leaved ash, which also 
produces it, but not in as great quantities as the former. Leaflets 
roundish, acutish, doubly serrate, subsessile; flowers with petals. 
Both these kinds may be raised from seeds as directed in page 271, 
or by grafting or budding them on any other species of ash. They 
are natives of Italy, Sicily, and the southern parts of Europe. 
They also cultivate in Sicily the Fraxinus excelsior, or common 
European ash, for that purposej which induces me to think, that if 
the above kinds were grafted low, on any of our American species, 
it would not prevent their yielding as good manna as if established 
on their own roots. Doctor Cullen supposes "manna to be a part 
of the sugar so universally present in vegetables, and which exudes 
on the surface of a great number of them." The qualities of these 
exudations he thinks are ''very little, if any, different." The prin- 
cipal trees known to produce these mannas, in different climates 
and seasons, are the larch, orange, walnut, willow, mulberry, and 
some different kinds of oak; which latter are found growing between 
Merdin and Diarbecker, and also in Persia near Khounsar. 
In Sicily the three species above mentioned, with the view of ob- 
taining manna from them, but more particularly the first, are planted 
on the declivities of hills, having eastern aspects. After ten years 
growth the trees first begin to yield manna, but they require to be 
much older before they afford it in any considerable quantity. Al- 
though the manna exudes spontaneously from the trunks and 
