302 
SPICES 
CHAP. 
could easily be grown successfully. Formerly it was 
extensively cultivated in Zanzibar, and in one of the 
consular reports (undated), quoted in the book All about 
Spices, we read that in one year 315,000 lbs. were grown, 
valued at 36,000 dollars. Later falls in price seem to 
have caused the abandonment of its cultivation, for 
Mr. Lyne, in July 1909, writes me, “ Pepper is here, but 
not cultivated.” 
West Indies and South America. — Though no 
doubt pepper could be grown well and productively in 
the New World, very little has ever been done in its 
cultivation there. 
Mr. Hart writes {Kew Bulletin, 1894, 79) that the 
pepper in Trinidad gave a good crop, and a crop of 
200 lbs. was harvested from some vines giving 2 lbs. 
each. Messrs. W. and D. Harvest report on the sample 
that it was clean and bold, and resembled the better 
qualities of Tellicherry black pepper, except that it 
had rather more husk. The value at the date at 
which it was prepared was 2f d. to 2 Jd. per lb. ; but the 
markets were then depreciated and an immense stock 
had been received from the Straits Settlements. A 
short time previously the Trinidad sample would have 
fetched 5d. to 5|-d. per lb. 
In Jamaica, pepper plants fruited in 1897 for the 
first time, but only two plants (Jamaica Bulletin, 
December 1897). 
There seems to have been some difficulty about the 
plant in Jamaica. Plants and seeds of good strains 
were sent from the Singapore Botanic Gardens on 
several occasions, but they never appear to have done 
well. 
USES OF PEPPER 
The use of pepper as a spice or condiment for 
flavouring dates from very early times. Its strong 
pungency and stimulative action on the digestive organs 
made it very much in demand for cookery. Black 
pepper is more pungent, and contains more of the 
