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Before entering into details concerning its cultivation perhaps it 
will be weU to mention very briefly a few of the obvious features of 
this well known plant. 
The stem is climbing, becoming stout and shrubby and reaching 
a height of ten feet or more : the branches are rooting at the rodes : 
the snnple leaves are glabrous, petioled and coriaceous, in size 5-7 
inches by 2 -o ins., the upper leaves being unequal sided: the flowers 
are minute on numerous spikes several inches long : the fruit is small 
round berries which are red when ripe. 
In most pepper gardens there are to be found two varieties of vine 
the smaH—foaved and the large-leaved. The former, being more 
fruitful is preferred before the large leaved variety of which there may 
be only a few representatives in a garden. On the large — leaved vine, 
many of the leaves are quite like those of the other variety but some few 
are considerably larger. Presumably, cuttings from small leaved vines 
always yield vines of that variety, so that if the pepper gardeners 
seriously attempted it, they could exclude the less fruitful form 
altogether. 
Most gardens contain one or two representatives of a third kind of 
vine, the so called male. This is indistinguishable from the small leaved 
vine until the fruiting season when the ‘male' produces only a small 
quantity of fruit. 
I have not been able to examine the flower spikes of these ‘male’ 
vines but presumably such would be found to be unisexual, the male 
flowers predominating. The flower spike of an ordinary vine is made 
up of numerous hermaphrodite flowers each consisting of an ovary 
capped by three tiny stigmas, and a pair of small stamens: the stigmas 
ripen before the anthers. 
Some gardeners look with favour on the ‘male’ vines and one 
man told me that in case a garden had no male* it was customary to 
grow a Sireh (Piper betle) vine to act as such ! However this may be 
it certainly is usual to find at least one Sireh vine in each pepper 
garden. 
lor the following information relating to the methods employed by 
Chinese agriculturalists in Upper Sarawak, I am indebted to Mr. Gerald 
Dalton of Busan who for several years has resided in the midst of the 
pepper growing area. 
Position . — The best position for a garden is a plain gently sloping 
towards the east and sheltered on either side. 
Preparation of the Ground. It usually happens that the land he 
has chosen is covered with jungle and this has to be felled and burned. 
The destruction of the jungle trees is complete, even the stumps and 
roots being unearthed after the general conflagration is over : these 
stumps are collected into heaps and used in making the burnt earth 
hereafter described. Then the ground is lined out and sticks are pla- 
ced at proper intervals, 6 ft. by 6 ft. apart to mark the positions of the 
future vines, drains being allowed for where necessary. The ground is 
now left for a month or two to dry, meanwhile being kept free from 
weeds : during this time good drains are made all round. After this 
the ground in the immediate neighbourhood of the sticks is "well hoed 
to the depth of a foot and is then piled up to form small mounds around 
