VEGETABLE AND ANIMAL PRODUCTIONS. 335 
uated on the front of the column. Each flower must he 
so treated at or about noon of the day on which it 
opens. 
“To cure vanilla-beans, gather when full, steep for 
about two minutes in boiling water, and place in flannel 
to dry in the sun. When perfectly dry, place them the 
next day on plates of iron or tin, anointing once or twice 
with sweet oil, to keep them soft and plump. Complete 
the curing process by exposing them carefully in the sun 
for several days [weeks]. When quite cured they should 
have a uniformly rich brown color, and the full fragrance 
of this valuable product.” 
In my own experience I have found it very diffi¬ 
cult properly to dry the pods in the damp atmosphere 
of the rainy season on the coast, and prefer to use 
the hot-air dryers now generally used for tea, coffee, 
cacao, etc. 
Of the family of ferns little need be said. The 
gold-fern (Gymnogramma aurea ) is a common weed at 
Livingston, and adiantums, lygodiums, and selaginellas 
are found everywhere in the forests. While the small 
ferns are abundant, tree-ferns are very scarce, only one 
specimen being seen (in the forests of El Mico), and that 
not a fine one. 
Mahogany.. — From the small extent of coast-line pos¬ 
sessed by Guatemala, her mahogany exports are perhaps 
not so extensive as those of the two Hondurases on either 
side of her. In 1884 there was exported of all woods 
(mahogany being the chief) from the port of Izabal (Liv¬ 
ingston) a measurement of 352,066 feet, valued at four 
cents a foot, or $14,082.64; while the shipments from 
Belize for the same time were about 3,000,000 feet, worth 
