SOME ACCOUNT OF THE NUTMEG AND ITS CULTIVATION. 655 
wood of the stem to replace the former loss. Young plants are all 
the better for having the two or three first series of verticles cut off, 
otherwise the tree becomes too shrubby and the lower branches 
touch the ground excluding air, forming altogether a very inferior 
plant. This practice would however be unsafe in places like Penang 
affected by droughts, unless the plants be kept v eil shaded, until 
the upper verticles are sufficiently large to afford protection to the 
roots. As the tree bleeds freely upon being cut, the Pruner ought to 
take along with him a pot of cement formed by boiling together 
two parts of pounded chalk and one of vegetable tar, which applied 
warm stops the run of the sap, gradually hardens and will remain on 
the cut part until it be quite healed. I have seen it stick on for se¬ 
veral years resisting all weathers. 
Some trees from receiving too great a check are apt to overbear, 
and will soon wear themselves out if not watched and relieved of 
their superabundant fruit. This ought to he done so soon as the fruit 
forms and if permitted to remain until three fourths grown the mis¬ 
chief is already effected and cannot easily be remedied, but even 
should the tree not perish, the crop will scarcely be worth the ga¬ 
thering so inferior will be the quality and the tree unable to perfect 
its fruit, which splits ere the mace is red and while the nut is soft and 
good for nothing. Unhappily some trees have a habit of splitting 
their fruit untimely although their general appearance indicates 
strength and vigor. This is a fault for which as yet I know of no 
remedy ; 1 attribute it to an original fault in the seed, and if this be 
correct I fear it admits of none. 
The planter having his tree arrived at the agreeable point of pro¬ 
ducing, has but slight trouble in preparing his produce for market. 
As the fruit is brought in by the gatherers, the mace is carefully re¬ 
moved, pressed together and flattened on a board, exposed to the sun 
for three or four days, it is then dry enough to be put by in the 
spice house until required for exportation, when it is to be screwed 
into boxes and becomes the mace of commerce. The nutmeg itself 
requires more care in its curing, it being necessary to have it well 
and carefully dried ere the outer black shell be broken. For this pur¬ 
pose the usual practice is to subject it for a couple of months to the 
smoke of slow fires kept up underneath, whilst the nuts are spread 
on a grating about eight feet above. I myself prefer one raised fully 
10 feet, but the model of a perfect drying house is easily obtained, 
and the process is too well known to require any further explana- 
