145 
Success might also attend the growing of Phaseolus calcar atus, 
P. Mungo and perhaps P. aconitifolius, all common in India, as well 
as the Japanese P. anqularis. • 
I anticipate no success with the chick pea, Cicer arietinum , and 
the lentil, Lens esculenta ; as they favour a drier climate, and are 
only to be found in Java at considerable elevations. The Field pea, 
Piswn arvense, also, for our plains is out of the question. 
Ground-nut cultivation has latterly been a source of large 
profits on the sandy river banks of Burma. But it is grown for oil 
and not for eating’, for which purpose there are distinct varieties 
differing mucf in the chemical composition of the seed : and I prefer 
to consider the ground-nut as an oil seed, and not as a food. 
Voandzeia, the Bambarra ground-nut, is more ideally a food 
crop, but it is of doubtful importance. 
Vigna catiang and Cajcmus indicus both grow well here, and 
are used as vegetables : but they furnish abroad seeds for eating. 
The latter yields for three years if it be appropriately cut back ; 
so that it is not a crop like the other beans and will not take a place 
in alternation with rice. Vigna catiang, under the name of cow -pea, 
takes a very important place in the agriculture of the United States 
where the climate is not suited for clover ; but it is not grown there 
for the seed, but for stock feeding and for green manure. Collection 
of the seed-harvest is laborious as it has to be done by hand daily ; 
and it is never large. 
Two other leguminous crops may be mentioned, namely, 
Canavalia, the sword bean, and Mncuna ' or Stizolobium, the velvet 
bean. Sword beans are eaten somewhat extensively in Mysore and 
some parts of the Bombay Presidency, and are grown a little in the 
Malay Peninsula. The seeds are quite wholesome, but the pod is 
generally consumed here unripe. 
Condiments. 
I turn to condiments, of native food. They are the last 
group of the food-stuffs for which I gave you trade returns : but 
I take them next as they are in such a l^irge measure sold dried, and 
therefore like cereals and beans travel easily and are stored. 
I consider* under the head of condiments such foods as onions, garlic, 
chillies, ginger* and cardamoms, which are in general use for 
flavouring and mixing with the more bulky substances that make up 
native food. 
Onions can, be grown in the Malay Peninsula, but perhaps 
not commercially, as the damp climate is unsuited for the arrest of 
leaf growth and the formation of a bulb. A few trials with them 
are recorded but no attempt has ever been made to ascertain 
exactly what can be done by seeking out the races (they exist) 
which do best under damp tropical conditions. Onions are grown 
K 
77 
