SOME ACCOUNT OF THE NUTMEG AND ITS CULTIVATION, 653 
upon a small than a large scale. A man by planting the Guinea grass 
and feeding cattle may make his own manure and I believe it to he 
the best mode of proceeding ; those who depend upon the town for 
their supplies will frequently meet with disappomment and never 
obtain such good manure. The price of manure generally speaking is 
about 8 cart loads for the dollar, each cart containing 20 baskets. I 
conceive that two such carts with a similar amount of burned earth to 
be little enough manure for a tree of 12 years of age. It is almost 
impossible for a Planter to manure the whole of his trees in the same 
season, if they amount to several thousands: in this case the best plan 
is to divide the property into sections, manuring them in regular 
rotation, and to apply a few baskets of manure as top dressing to any 
particular trees that shew symptoms of flagging. 
The nutmeg Planter is under the necessity of keeping up nurse¬ 
ries throughout the whole of his operations, for the replacement of 
bad plants and redundant males. Of the latter, ten per cent 
seems to be about the best proportion to keep, but I -would have 
completely Dioecious trees. No person can boast to get a plantation 
completly filled up and in perfect order much sooner than 15 years. 
Of the first batch planted, not more than one half will turn out per¬ 
fect females, for I do not take into account Monsecious trees which 
1 have already condemned. The tree shows flower about the 7th year, 
but the longer it is before doing so, the better and stronger will it 
be. I cannot refrain from a smile when a sanguine planter informs 
me with exultation that he lias obtained a nut from a tree only 3 or 
4 years planted out,—so much the worse for his chance, of success, 
too great precocity being incompatible with strength and longevity. 
The best trees do not shew flower before the 9th year, and one such 
is worth a score of the others. This will be evident when it is stated 
that I have seen several trees yield more than ten thousand nuts 
each in one year, whereas I do not believe that there is a plantation 
in the Straits that averages 1000 from every tree. This very great 
disparity of bearing shews plainly that the cultivation of the plant 
is not yet thoroughly understood, or greater uniformity would pre¬ 
vail, and I think it clearly enough points out that a higher degree of 
cultivation would meet its reward. It is not quite safe to cut down 
the male plants upon first shewing flower, as they many times 
show perfectly female flowers the following year, and in that case 
are generally the strongest and finest trees. But there is some indi¬ 
cation of this in the first mode of flowering. When the racemes are 
