THE DETERMINATION
One gram of the substance to be analyzed is brought into a digestion flask with approximately 0.7 grams of mercuric-oxide, and 20 cubic centimeters of sulphuric acid, and the flask is placed on the frame described in an inclined position, and heated below the boiling point of the acid for from five to fifteen minutes, or until frothing has ceased. The heat is then raised until it boils briskly. No further attention is required until the contents of the flask have become a clear liquor, which is colorless, or, at least, has only a very pale straw color. The flask is then removed from the flame, held upright, and, while yet hot, potassium permanganate is dropped in carefully and in small quantities at a time until, after shaking, the liquid remains of a green or purple color.
After cooling, the contents of the flask are then transferred to the distilling flask with water, and to this 25 cubic centimeters of potassium-sulphide solution are added, 50 cubic centimeters of the soda solution, or sufficient to make the reaction strongly alkaline, and with a few pieces of granulated zinc.
The flask is at once connected with the condenser and the contents of the flask are distilled until all of the ammonia has passed over into the standard acid contained in the precipitating flask previously described and the concentrated solution can no longer be safely boiled.
This operation usually requires from 20 to 40 minutes. The distillate is then titrated with standard ammonia. The use of the mercuric-oxide in this operation greatly shortens the time necessary for digestion, which is rarely over an hour and a half in the case of substances most difficult to oxidize, and is more commonly less than an hour.
In most cases the use of potassium permanganate is quite unnecessary, but it is believed that in exceptional cases it is required for complete oxidation, and, in view of the uncertainty, it is always used.
Potassium-sulphide removes all mercury from solutions and so prevents the formation of mercuro-ammonium compounds which are not completely decomposed by soda solution.
The addition of zinc gives rise to an evolution of hydrogen and prevents violent bumping. Previous to use, the reagents should be tested by a blank experiment with sugar, which will partially reduce any nitrates that are present which might otherwise escape notice.
This method cannot be used for the determination of nitrogen substances which contain nitrate or certain albumenoids.
These methods of analysis are suitable to all spices and have been used with them. They are but a general process, however, and are dependent for their value on uniformity in the way they are carried out and the manner in which peculiarities of proximate composition in different spices are considered in drawing conclusions; determinations of particular substances, such as piperine, require, however, modifications, which must be described when discussing the analysis of each separate spice.
The chemical composition of olive stones and cocoanut shells is about as follows:
| Water, | 5.63 | 6.15 |
| Ash, | 4.28 | 2.15 |
| Fiber, | 41.33 | 37.15 |
| Albumenoids, | 1.56 | 1.25 |
| Nitrogen, | .25 | .20 |
BLACK PEPPER (Piper Nigrum)
1 Malabar
2 Acheen or Sumatra
3 Mangalore
4 Singapore
5 White, from Penang, with all three coats removed
6 White, with one coat removed
7, 8 Parts of spikes
9, 10 Fruit
12 Ovary with stamens
13 Stamens
14 Portion of spike
15 A flowering twig
CHAPTER IV
BLACK PEPPER
FRENCH, Poivre; German, Pfeffer; Italian, Pepe Nero; Spanish, Pimienta; Portuguese, Pimenta; Cyngalese, Gammaris; Javanese, Maricha; Persian, Filfll-Seeah; Hindoostanse, Gol-mirch.
Pepper (Piper) Nigrum, a name employed by the Romans, and derived by them from the Greek word peperi; the Greeks in their turn must have derived it from the Hindoos. Botanically it is applied to the typical genus plant of the natural order piperaceae. Of all the varieties of spices used as a condiment, pepper is the only one which grows on a climbing vine, and there is no kind of spice better known or more esteemed or more extensively used than pepper. Its consumption is enormous.
Black pepper is one of the earliest spices known to mankind, being of extreme antiquity. Choice spices and rare gums were among the precious treasures of the kings of Egypt more than two thousand years before the Christian era.
The history of its development from earliest times is well brought out by the account given in the Pharmacopœia. According to Fluckiger and Hanbury the spice was well known as early as the fourth century B. C. Arrian, the author of Periplus of the Frythrean Sea, which was written about A. D. 618, states that pepper was then imported from Barake, the shipping place of Nelkunda localities, which have been identified with points on the Malabar coast. To this spice, Venice, Genoa, and other commercial cities of central Europe are indebted for much of their wealth.
The caravan of trading Midianites, who purchased Joseph from his brethren and sold him into Egypt were bearers of “spices and balm” for the Egyptian market, and when the sons of Jacob were making preparations to visit the land the second time to propitiate the lord of the realm, their father said to them: “Take of the best fruits of the land and carry down a little balm, and a little honey, spice, and myrrh, nuts and almonds.”
During the palmy days of Egypt, when they embalmed all of their distinguished dead, precious gums and fragrant pungent spices were largely called into requisition. Even the Israelites in their ritualistic worship held in such high esteem many of these rare gums and oils that their law forbade their use for any other purpose.
Pepper received mention in the epic poems of the ancient Hindoos. Theophrastus differentiated between round and long pepper, Diascarides mentioned long pepper, white pepper and black pepper, and Pliny, the naturalist, expressed his surprise that it should come into general use considering its want of flavor, and he states that the price of pepper in his time at Rome was nine shillings and four pence per pound, English money. Both he and Diascarides, as well as Hippocrates, write of the medicinal virtues of spices and of their use in medicine. Pepper has been so scarce at times and so expensive that one pound was considered a royal present, and was used like money as a medium of exchange, while at other times its market value has been very low.
In its frequent mention by Roman writers of the Augustan age we are told that it was used by them to pay tribute. One of the articles demanded by Alaric, the daring ruler of the barbaric Visigoths in 410 A. D., of this conquered and greatly humiliated race was 3,000 pounds of pepper. During this dark middle age pepper was so costly that rents were paid in pepper corn, the amount being about one pound at stated times. Even now in places this custom still continues. It is not, therefore, surprising that during the first centuries of the Christian era the common black pepper was prized as highly in the city of Rome as its weight in gold. Black pepper is found in the East Indian Islands, among which may be mentioned the Malay Archipelago, Java, Sumatra, Rhio, Johore. It is also a native of Siam and Cochin China, and it grows wild in the forests of Malabar and Travancore. It is cultivated in some parts of the United States and in the West India Islands.
The early history of the pepper trade is similar to that of other Eastern spices. The Dutch for a long time confined the cultivation of it to the Island of Java. To accomplish this they forced its cultivation with so much earnestness that they defeated their own purpose and a more enlightened system has prevailed for the past thirty years. Since it is no longer under government monopoly, and entire freedom is allowed in the raising of this spice, its cultivation has been greatly increased. The king of Portugal contracted with middlemen in each of his forts on the coast of Malabar for an annual supply of 30,000 quintals of pepper, and bound himself to send five ships every year to export that amount. All risk was held by the middlemen or farmers “who landed it in Portugal.” As a compensation for this risk, the middlemen obtained the price of twelve ducats a quintal and had great and strong privileges: “First, that no man of what estate or condition soever he be, either Portingall or of any place in India, may deale or trade in pepper, but they upon paine of death which is very sharply looked into. And although the pepper were for the king’s own person, yet must the farmers pepper be first laden to whom the Viceroy and other officers and Captains of India must give all assistance, helpe and favour with watching same and all other things whatsoever that shall by said farmers be required for the safetie and benefite of the said pepper.”
In fact, it was because the price of pepper was so high during the Middle Ages that the Portuguese were led to seek a sea route to India. After the passage around the Cape of Good Hope had been discovered, about 1496, there was a considerable reduction in the price of pepper, and when it began to be cultivated in the Islands of the Malay Archipelago, another reduction was made. It, however, remained a monopoly of the Portuguese crown for many years, even as late as the eighteenth century. The earliest reference to a trade in pepper in England is A. D. 978-1016, when it was enacted that traders bringing their ships to Billingsgate should pay at Christmas and Easter, with other tributes, ten pounds of pepper.
Great Britain derived a duty from it for centuries, and as late as 1623 this duty was five shillings, or about $1.20 per pound. English grocers were known as “Peppers.” Even in 1823 the duty was two shillings and six pence per pound. The pepper alluded to by Pliny at his time in Rome must have been the product of Malabar, the nearest part of India to Europe, and must have cost in Malabar about 2d. per pound. It probably went to Europe by crossing the Indian and Arabian oceans with the easterly monsoon, sailing up the Red Sea, crossing the desert, and then going down the Nile, and making its way along the Mediterranean. This voyage in our time can be made in one month; at that time it probably took eighteen months. Transit and custom duties must have been paid over and over again and there must have been plenty of extortion. These facts will explain how pepper could not be sold in the Roman market under fifty-six times its prime cost. Immediately previous to the discovery of the route to India by the Cape of Good Hope we find that the price of pepper in the market of Europe had fallen to 6s. a pound, or 3s. 4d. less than in the time of Pliny. What probably contributed to this fall in price was the superior skill in navigation of the now converted Mohammedan Arabs, Turks, and Venetians, and the extension of their commerce in the Eastern Archipelago, which abounded in pepper.
Black pepper was then for many years considered a very choice article and, like gold, silver, and precious stones, it was possessed only by persons of wealth, and was for generations found only on royal tables and those of the rich and noble who aspired to rank with the rulers of the realm.
The British gave up the chief pepper ground of the world, which was the grand Island of Sumatra, to the Dutch for the small Dutch colony in Western Africa, which has involved both nations in little wars and has cost the Dutch more lives and money than it is worth; but prestige must also be sustained, and general after general returned with a shattered reputation from the “Atyeh,” as the Dutch called Acheen. When the East India Company first formed a settlement on the coast of Sumatra, it directed its attention to produce large growths of pepper. A stipulation was made with some of the native chiefs, binding them to compel their subjects each to cultivate a certain number of pepper vines, and the whole product was to be delivered to the company’s agents at a price far below the actual cost of cultivation and harvesting. The chiefs for a long time enforced obedience to this arbitrary measure and their success in this was supposed to be permanently assured by granting them an allowance proportionate to the quantity of pepper delivered.
This arbitrary practice was too keenly felt by the natives to be endured, and, the influence of the chiefs soon declining and the people becoming negligent in the cultivation, the annual supply fell off. The chiefs, unable longer to maintain their despotic practice, abandoned to the agents of the company the task of obliging the people to labor that others might reap. Now the rights of the people are more respected and the injustice of the methods formerly used are fully acknowledged; the cultivation of pepper in Sumatra, as well as elsewhere, is free.
Perhaps the earliest writer to describe the extent of the cultivation of pepper was Linschoten. He speaks of its coming from Mala or Malabar, and his friend and commentator of pepper, Paludanus, enters into a long account of its medicinal virtues. “It warmeth the mawe,” he writes, “and consumeth the cold slymenes thereof to ease the payne in the mawe which proceedeth of rawnesse and winde, it is good to eat fyve pepper cornes everie morning. He that hath a bad or thick sight, let him use pepper cornes with annis fennel seed and cloves for there by the mystinesse of the eyes which darken the sight is cleared and driven away.” But in modern medicine it is very little used, being rarely prescribed except indirectly as an ingredient of some compound.
Black pepper is the dried fruit of the piper nigrum, a perennial climbing shrub indigenous to the forests of Travancore, a native state in India, province of Madras, and of Malabar, a province of India, from which it has been introduced into the other countries mentioned.
Two species of piper will be found under drugs, “Cubebs” and a third falls within the range of the articled drugs “Kava-Kava,” and Narcotics; and two others are dealt with under “Narcotics.” There remain then for description as spice, black pepper, white pepper, long pepper, and Ashantee pepper.
In planting a new garden where no wild pepper vines are to be had, level land is selected which borders on a river or small stream without much sloping, but not so low as to be liable to any overflow from the stream, as the land must be kept well drained. Pepper is a hardy plant and will grow on almost any soil, but not on old, worn-out plantations or on poor sandy or clay soil, as more depends on the soil than on the cultivation. It should not be planted on hillsides because the earth will wash from the roots in time of rains. The best soil for pepper culture is a well-drained vegetable loam; swamp lands are very good in a hot climate with heavy rains.
The vine may be propagated either from the seed or by cuttings. When berries are selected for seed they are first soaked for three days, when the outer coat can be removed. The seed is then dried in the shade, after which it is sown by drills in nursery beds, which are made in the usual manner in good moist soil in a shady locality. Frequent watering will be necessary, if it be a dry time, until the plants have four leaves, when they will be ready for planting.
The land to be planted is to be cleared of underbrush. Sometimes large trees are burned by setting fire to their trunks. The tree will then decay and will be attacked by insects and will become a heap of rotten dust. This dust is washed by the rain around the roots of the vines, making a good fertilizer.
The land cleared is next well planted and hoed and is lined out 7 × 7 feet, and holes are dug two feet square and fifteen inches deep, which are filled with good soil or leaf mold if it can be secured. In filling these holes they should not be heaped, as depressions are better for the plant, but care should be taken that all that portion of the plant underground in the nursery should be buried in the garden.
The land is fenced by mud walls made into terraces. The vines need support, for if they are not supported they will spread over the ground with the result that there will be much loss of fruit.
When posts are used, as is the case on the Island of Borneo, they should be twelve feet long and eight inches square, with the lower end tarred for two feet, to prevent decaying in the ground. The plantation will then have the appearance of a hop field. But there are many disadvantages in connection with the post support, as the posts must be reset at intervals (much oftener than the vines) and the removing of the post disturbs the aerial roots of the vine, which cling to them. Even if the vine be trained to its new post, it will take some time for it to attach sufficiently to receive any support or nourishment. As the poles furnish little or no shade, a severe drought will largely ruin the plants. For these reasons the use of posts has not proved a success. Different countries use different growing trees for the support, thus securing shade protection as well. Many kinds of trees are used. One of these is the mango or the bread tree, which will yield the planter one crop of fruit each year in addition to the pepper crop; but the bread tree (artocarpus-incioa), being of slow growth, should not be used for a support until it is twelve years old. The Jack tree (artocarpus-integrifolia) is sometimes used in Malabar as a second choice, but its fruit is diminished in quantity and quality by the pressure of the pepper, and sometimes the monkeys will pull them out or the crickets nip off the tops. The erythrina-Indica (erythrina coroilodendron), a thorn tree called by the natives chingkariang, is much used in Sumatra for an early support. It grows quickly and is easily started by simply sticking a large branch in the ground in the rainy season. It will be capable of supporting the vine in one year, but it will soon be killed by the growing vine, not lasting more than twelve years. For this reason the mango or bread tree is planted beside it and when the erythrina-Indica tree dies out the first choice mango tree (manganifera-Indica) is ready to take its place and will furnish support for the vine for twenty years. Moreover, the fruit of the tree will not be affected by the growing vines. Plantations are set on the tilled land from July to August about twelve paces apart. In February and March the supporting trees are planted forty feet apart. They are kept well watered during the dry season, and when ten feet high are topped and kept trimmed or the leaves are picked off so as not to shade the plant too much. If the pepper garden is small, the vines may be planted near the trees already growing. Plants raised from the seed in nurseries are transplanted in May or June, being placed in the prepared holes five feet apart with their root end from the tree and with the growing perennial vine top directed towards its support. The root should be as far distant as possible from the support. If the plants are of slow growth, manure may be applied to the surface of the ground. In China burnt earth and rotten fish are used. The land must be kept free from weeds and the plants must be kept well watered on alternate days in the dry season.
The pepper vines are trained to their support in October and November. They may begin to bear fruit the first year, but do not yield much until the third or fourth year. The hoeing, training, and fertilizing are kept up twice each year in October and November and July and August. The moist earth should be heaped up and well tramped down about the plant. When the vines are six feet high they will cling to the trees without further training. The vines will bear for about fourteen years and even thirty years sometimes in extra good soil, but when past fourteen years they will usually decline in vigor and fruitfulness. The vine, after topping, is from eight to ten feet long, but if left to grow its full length will be from twenty to thirty feet long and will go to wood and bear less fruit, and the fruit would be difficult to gather. When cuttings are to be used for planting, at least three should be placed in each hole with six inches under ground or four inches above ground, the portion above ground to be directed towards the support. The plantation is next covered with leaves, dried grass, or weeds as a protection from the sun and to keep the earth moist and cool.
The vines grow rapidly if it is wet weather. When they have run up the support two feet, the ends are nipped off so as to cause lateral branches to start out. In some places, when the vines are from a year to eighteen months old and have grown five feet up the support, they are carefully detached and the ends, having been coiled up in a spiral form, are buried in a hole dug in the ground close to its roots, except a small surface of the stem. This process is called letting down. It insures a large crop, producing seven or more vines to one supporting tree. Plants raised from cuttings will only bear from seven to eight years, but the quantity and quality of the pepper is far superior to that raised from the seed.
The planting of the cuttings in baskets is often carried on in the following manner: The cuttings, which are about eighteen inches long, are put half a dozen in a basket; at higher altitudes more are used, sometimes as many as ten or twelve. The basket is then filled with earth and is buried at the foot of the supporting tree, care being taken that they do not touch. In October and November the ground around the baskets is dug up and the vines are manured with cow dung and leaves. The baskets are said to be a great protection to the young vines and they insure much better results. The end of the vine makes the best cutting, as it is a growing terminal bud. Vines growing wild, such as are indigenous to the forests of Malabar and Travancore, are left planted with the forest trees for their support. The surplus shade and underbrush are cut out and the ground is weeded, old vines being replaced by young ones. The product raised in this way is about as good as the cultivated.
A pepper garden is generally planted with plenty of room for roads, so as to secure easy access to all parts of it and with the least possible grade, which should not be more than one foot in twenty. The garden contains anywhere from five to fifteen acres and is divided into plots by hedges of shrubs, each plot containing from five hundred to one thousand plants. The plants are pruned or thinned by hand as they grow bushy at the top, when the flexible stems generally entwine at the top of their support and then bend downward, having their extremities as well as their branches loaded with fruit. It matters not how many stalks grow from the same root until the vine begins to bear fruit, but when fruit bearing begins only one or two stems should be left, as more would weaken the root and it would not, for that reason, bear as abundantly. All suckers and side shoots must be carefully removed. Trenches are cut to the neighbor props where the vines have failed, and through these trenches superfluous shoots are conducted, where they soon ascend around the adjacent tree. By this means the plantation is of a uniform growth, and, since the ground is kept well weeded and is elevated, and since there is an open border of twelve feet wide around each garden, there is given to the plantation an admirable symmetry and neatness of appearance.
HARVESTING OF BLACK PEPPER
COAST NEAR MANGALORE
The pepper vine or climbing shrub is mentioned by Sir John Mandeville in his travels of 1322 to 1356 as follows: “The pepper growethe in manere as doth a wylde vine that is planted fast by the trees of the woodee for to susteynen it by, as doth the vyne and fruyt thereof hangethe in manere as Reysinges; and the tree is so thikke charged that it semethe that it wolde breke, and when it is ripe it is all grene as it were ivy berryes; and then men kytten them as men doe the vynes and then they putten it upon an owven and there it waxeth blak and crisp.”
This simple description will in some respects answer our purpose at the present time. The leaf of the pepper vine is entire, simple, alternate, without stipules, broad, and fleshy, or oval or heart-shaped. The leaves are arranged in clusters of five to seven in number, opposite the flower stalk, and the flowers, which are glossy-white, are very insignificant in appearance upon a long slender pendulous spadix. They are for the most part uni-sexual, either manœcious or diœcious; that is, the staminate (male flower) and pistillate (female) flowers are separate either upon different branches of the same plant (manœcious) or upon different plants (diœcious). The leaves are four to six inches long, and they partake strongly of the aromatic and peculiar smell and pungent taste of the berry. The small fruit grows loosely on the pendulous fruit stalks or spikes. A single vine will bear from twenty to thirty fruit spikes and each spike contains twenty to forty berries. If they were allowed to ripen, the berries would lose some of their pungency and would gradually fall off.
The pepper vine produces two crops annually, the first in December and January, at the time of the first monsoon. The flowers of the second crop appear in March and April, at the time of the little monsoon, and the crop is gathered in July and August. The second crop is inferior both in quality and quantity, probably on account of lack of moisture. The pepper berry is a small, round, sessile, fleshy fruit, which at first appears green, next red, and finally yellow when fully ripe. When one or two berries at the base of the spike begin to turn red the entire spike is pinched off.
In gathering the fruit, the natives make use of a small triangular ladder made of bamboo, with which they go around the tree and reach all the fruit as they go. The fruit is put in small baskets slung over the shoulder (see illustrations) of the gatherer. It is then taken by those who work on the ground to a smooth, level spot of clean, hard ground and spread on mats or platforms to dry (mat drying is said to give heavier returns), care being taken to carry it in at night so as to escape the dews. After three days, as the drying proceeds, the berries are removed by rubbing with the hands and are picked clean or winnowed in large round sieves. In some eastern localities mills operated by hand facilitate the work. After the berries have become dry they will shrivel and turn black or chocolate. Those gathered too soon will after being dried become dust.
The berries after drying are spherical and about one-fifth of an inch in diameter and are wrinkled on the surface, indistinctly pointed below by the remains of a very short pedical and crowned by three or four lobed stigmas. The thin pericarp tightly encloses a single seed, the embryo of which, on account of the premature gathering is not fully developed and is replaced by the cavity below the apex. The seed itself contains within the thin red-brown testa a shining albumen of angular, radically arranged, large-celled parenchyme, gray and horny without and mealy within.
The transverse section of a grain of pepper exhibits a soft, yellowish epidermis covering; the outer pericarp is formed of a closely packed yellow layer of large and most radically arranged thick-walled cells, most of which are colorless and loaded with starch; others contain a soft, yellowish, amorphous mass, each containing in its minute cavity a quantity of dark-brown resin, while the middle layer of the pericarp consists of starch and oil, the shrinkage of which causes the deep wrinkles on the surface of the berry. The next inner layer of the pericarp exhibits its circumference tangentially arranged soft parenchyme, the cells of which possess either spiral striation or spiral fibers, but towards the interior lose parenchyme free from starch and containing very large oil cells. The testa is formed in the first place of a row of small yellowish thick-walled cells, next to which follows the true testa as a dense, dark-brown layer of lignified cells, the individual outlines of which are indistinguishable. If thin slices are kept under glycerine for some time these masses are slowly transformed into needle-shaped crystals of piperine. The angular cells of the interior of the seed are, of course, the more prominent and, when once seen, their characteristic form and contents are easily recognized again. The structure of the outer coats is made out with more difficulty, and before attempting to do so on ground pepper it is best to soften some whole black and white pepper corns in glycerine and cut sections from various parts of the exterior of the berry.
White pepper, since it is allowed to ripen fully, has the most distinctness, and, since it lacks the wrinkles, it will not be found difficult to pick out three layers of different cells from a section from it mounted in glycerine, composing the outer coat of the corn, besides angular large cells of the interior which are filled with starch and piperine, the latter being yellow in color. The first of these layers, the outer one, is made of colorless, large, loosely arranged cells with some fibers toward the exterior more compact than those toward the interior of the layer and carrying globules of oil. This layer makes up the principal part of the husk of the white pepper. The second layer is a part of what is generally called the testa and consists of small yellow cells, thick walled and closely oppressed. Next comes the third layer and second portion of the testa, which consists of lignified brown cells, which in their transverse appearance resemble some of the cells of mustard hulls. The individuality of these cells is not made out easily, owing to the thickness of the walls. After the observer has become thoroughly familiar with these appearances of the white pepper he should examine ground pepper, which will be found to differ in the way in which these coats are to be presented; they can be recognized, however, and must be studied until thoroughly understood.
The black pepper is not as simple in its arrangement as the white, the maturity of the white giving it distinctness, while the shrunken character of the black berry makes the recognition of its various tissues difficult. In a section from the exterior of a softened black pepper, the interior coats, after what has been learned of the white, will be quickly recognized, but they are not plainly developed. The coats of the outer pericarp, which in the white pepper were wanting, will be found to be darker colored, shrunken and confused, so that it requires much study to discover the forms of the cells, which may be more easily found in the powdered black pepper; there the structure already recognized in the ground white pepper will be seen and in addition dark-brown particles, portions of the outer coats. Careful examinations of different particles will reveal some which consist of the elongated, vertical exterior cells containing resin, while others are the shrunken parenchyme cells of the second layer, whose structure is indistinct.
The colored portion of a ground black pepper divides itself into two classes, the dark particles which have just been mentioned and the deep reddish ones which are made up of the testa of the seed and its adherent parenchyme. The two will be readily recognized and distinguished from adulterants by investigation.
There are in all about forty different species of pepper plant, consisting of herbs, shrubs, and trees. They are generally named from the city or country of export. The differences in appearance of the product coming from various sources are sufficiently marked to be readily noticed when samples of each are at hand side by side, but otherwise it is almost impossible to distinguish between some of them. The goodness of the pepper depends more on the quality of the soil than on the cultivation, although cultivation will increase the yield. The fine Tellicherry pepper together with the Alleppy are considered the best varieties. Tellicherry is named from the city of Tellicherry of British India, province of Maladar, district of Madras. Alleppy is named from the city of Alleppy, which is the capital of the native state Travancore in the district of Madras. These are closely followed by the Malabar pepper from the district of Malabar, India. These varieties are sun-dried. Next comes the fine Penang pepper, named from the city of Penang, meaning “betalnut” (see [illustration]) in the Straits Settlement. This is followed by the Singapore, named from the city of Singapore, and meaning City of the Lion (see [illustration]), which is also in the Straits Settlement, and is the largest export city of spice in the world, being the center of export for spices grown in the Malay Peninsula as well as in Java and Sumatra and of that rich state known as Johore, in the southern extremity of the Malay Peninsula.
ACHEEN
TELLICHERRY COAST FROM OLD FORT, LOOKING NORTH
Singapore pepper, by reason of its dark color and fairly uniform quality, is a good-looking pepper, and for that reason it is esteemed, but for grinding purposes it has not been heretofore so highly regarded, because of its smoky odor, as it is dried over smoke. The pepper plantation and the gambier plantation of Johore are usually under one management, and in boiling down the gambier to make the vegetable extracts there are suspended over the kettle mats on which are placed quantities of the Singapore pepper.
The smoke from the furnace dries and at the same time blackens the pepper and gives it the unmistakable smoky smell which is characteristic of Singapore pepper. This smoky odor is retained to a considerable degree after the pepper is ground, and it is one of the tests by which pepper merchants determine whether a given sample is Singapore or not. The Singapore pepper from Borneo is divided into, first, the Mullacca, which is the best and heaviest; second, the Caytongee; and third, the poorest sort, Negara, which is most abundant, and which is small and usually falls to dust. Mangalore pepper, named from the city of Mangalore ([Fig. 3]), is the largest pepper corn grown. It is nearly twice the size of ordinary pepper, is of a deep black color, very clean, and of uniform size. When ground it yields a powder of a characteristic greenish appearance. Lampong pepper takes its name from a district bordering on the east end of the Island of Sumatra near the Straits of Sunda where it grows. There is also a city in the district by the name, Lampong (meaning bobbing in water), where all the men and women meet at a central market house to transact their business matters. The Lampong pepper corns are less uniform in size than those of the other varieties before mentioned, and are also of a lighter color, and the surface contains much dirt. Acheen, Sumatra, or West Coast, are names applied to the pepper found on the great wild island of Sumatra, visited by Marco Polo in 1291. The island is divided into semi-independent states, each being ruled by its own prince or chief, who may be called Sultan, Rajah, or Datto. The interior of Sumatra is inhabited by the lion and the tiger, and by bands of savage Malays mixed with Dyaks of Borneo and Hindoos, some of whom are very savage. Among these are the head-hunters, or cannibals, who impose as a penalty for certain crimes that the guilty one is to be cut to pieces and eaten, and sometimes is to be eaten alive. This class of people are found in the south of Achin.
Acheen pepper ([Fig. 2]) takes its name from the district by that name, or from the city of Acheen (native dialect, Atkeh) (see [illustration]) and the district of Acheen, which exported in the year 1904, 60,000 piculs (136 lbs. each); Telak Betang (South Sumatra) exported 50,000 piculs (136 lbs. each); Padang, Sumatra (meaning an open plain), produces much pepper of good quality, and the Bataks, of North Sumatra, have long been devoted to its cultivation. The designation East and West Coast, as formerly used, have been (as have also the three names it was known by on the island, “Iada-Iawor” or “Lampoon,” “Iada Manna,” and “Iada Jambee”) lost track of, and the pepper is now designated according to its specific gravity as A, B, C, or D grade.
A grade weighs at least 4 lbs., 13 oz. to the imperial gallon (481 grams per liter).
B grade weighs at least 4 lbs., 5 oz. to the imperial gallon (431 grams per liter).
C grade weighs at least 3 lbs., 13 oz. to the imperial gallon (381 grams per liter).
D grade weighs at least 3 lbs., 5 oz. to the imperial gallon (586 grams per liter).
There has probably not been any of the A grade of Acheen black pepper in this country for several years, for the reason that it is this grade of pepper that is preferred by the manufacturers of Penang white pepper; and since it is used up in that way it does not reach our market except in the form of white pepper, [Fig. 5]. The best way to test the quality of the whole pepper is by weight, the heavier being the best. It takes 6,984 Singapore pepper corns ([Fig. 4]) to weigh one pound, while the finer grades of Tellicherry or Malabar ([Fig. 1]) require but 6,400.
CENTRAL MARKET LOMPONG (Bobbing in Water) TELAH BENTONG
A HOME IN ALLEPPY
Pepper is sometimes graded by putting it in water, when the heavy sinks and the light swims; the water also removes the dirt that might adhere to it. Shot pepper is the heavier black pepper put through a soaking and hardening process. Afterwards it is oiled to give it a better appearance, but as the water is injurious to the berry it is now generally separated in a column of air. The better appearance thus given to the shot pepper makes it more in demand and gives it a higher market value.
From what has been said, we can readily understand that the quality of pepper differs in the different localities. Pepper will hold its strength longer than any other spice. It has been found by mixing Malabar for weight, Penang for strength, and Sumatra for color, we get the most desirable powdered article. Malabar pepper has about twice the strength of Singapore, which has twice the strength of Sumatra. The Atjeh, Atchin or Acheen, pepper from the northeastern part of Sumatra, and that from the province of Batak in the more central eastern part of Sumatra Island, as received in this country, contain much earthy matter, and the East Archipelago pepper culture, including the islands of Johore and Rhio, is so widely spread as to give us large and various qualities.
The city of Penang, in the Straits Settlement, exported in the year 1904, 53,613 bags of black pepper and 22,415 bags of white pepper, being about half of the entire supply, and the Island of Ceylon exported in 1904, 2,746 cwt. of pepper valued at $379.83. Saigon, China, has also many acres under cultivation. Of course, when the price of pepper is high, there is more profit for the grower, and the laborer is given more employment, since the acreage is increased. Advances of money are made to the Chinaman by the merchants, who take security on the growing pepper at a rate fixed much below its actual value. The Chinaman on this advance money erects a small building required as a home, and purchases his farming implements and has two dollars monthly for food and for opium, and at the end of the third year the plantation is equally divided between the contracting parties. One man can take care of about 3,000 plants after they come into bearing. Ashantee pepper or West African (and as it is sometimes called, African Cubebs) is the fruit of the piper, (Cubeb) “Clusii,” and is principally from Niam-Niam, a district in Guinea bordering on the Gulf of Guinea in Africa, and is locally used as a substitute for black pepper, but has a hollow berry, much smaller and less wrinkled. In the southwest of India, where pepper grows wild, it is found in rich, moist soil, usually in narrow valleys. It propagates itself by running along on the ground and throwing off shoots every few feet. The natives, in caring for it, merely tie the ends of the vines to trees at distances at least six feet apart, and especially to those having a rough bark, as the vine readily clings to the rough surface of the tree. In India the berries of (Embelia) (Samara) Ribes are often mixed with pepper.
There is also a fruit called Melegueta pepper, known also as “Guinea Grains,” Grains of Paradise, or Alligator pepper, which is the seed of Amomum Mele Gueta, a plant of the ginger family, which contains seeds which are exceedingly pungent and are used as a spice through Central and Northern Africa. The cultivation of the pepper plant in the Western Hemisphere has been attended with fair success where it has been perseveringly pursued, but there is little probability that it can successfully compete even in the West India islands with that of those countries where the plant is indigenous. Jamaica pepper, which is a native of the Island of Jamaica, belongs more to the fruit of pimenta, an account of which is given under a separate chapter. The yield of pepper varies in different localities and may be from one and one-half to eight or ten pounds to a single vine. The third year the yield is one catty; fourth year, one and one-half catty; the fifth year, three and one-half catties, a catty being one and one-third pounds. Four thousand pounds is a good average to one acre. Ten pounds of green berries make only four to five pounds when dried and bagged for the market.
SINGAPORE (City of the Lion)
VIEW IN HARBOR OF PENANG FROM STEAMER LOOKING NORTHWEST
Copyright by Underwood and Underwood, N. Y.
It is hard to estimate the amount of black pepper used each year, but it is very great. The United States consumes more spices pro rata than any other country. This fact is well known by exporters after long experience, and now many spices are shipped direct to the United States ports instead of by the way of London.
The chief use of pepper is that of a spice added principally to meats, but also to other food substances. Pepper is sometimes used for medicinal purposes, as it stimulates the stomach on account of the piperine it contains, and thus aids in digestion. In removing ringworms it has few equals. The native doctors of India consider it a stimulant, and they prescribe an infusion of the toasted berries in cases of cholera morbus; it will check violent vomiting in that disease when many other remedies fail. They also prepare a liniment from pepper which they think has sovereign virtue in chronic rheumatism. In Europe it is sometimes used as a stimulant in gout and palsy, and the watery infusion has proved a useful gargle in relaxation of the uvula. The dose of black pepper should be about six grains.
The chief enemies of the pepper vine are white ants, the black bug and white bug, the borer, male crickets, and the Cinchana caterpillar. A strong solution of tuba root is sufficient to keep away white ants, and tuba root mixed with juice of common tobacco will prevent the black and white bug work, and in mild cases ashes or sulphur and lime applied early in the morning will be found sufficient. The borer begins by attacking the joints of the branches and its presence is known by the light yellowish color of the bark. There is no known preventive for the borer, except to catch it before it has gone too far. It always works around the joints, and when it has completed the circle, it commences to bore down the center of the branch, and sometimes, but very seldom, the stem. The male cricket goes for the roots, but does the least damage; if it has gone too far to be dug out, the best way is to plug up its hole as far as possible with clay.
The green Cinchana caterpillar attacks the leaves only, but may destroy many of them; the only plan to make way with it is to send a coolie around to collect and destroy the insects.
Whole pepper is seldom or never adulterated, although much is uncleaned. Old, water-soaked stock is at times found on the market. Several years ago two thousand bags were thrown into the Thames River from a wharf which was on fire, and was later offered for sale at auction. The powdered article, however, is adulterated more than any other condiment used as a table spice. The adulteration is made by almost any cheap, foreign article attainable and in a most ridiculous and not only unlawful but inhuman way. The probable reasons why pepper is selected for this more extensive abuse are found in the fact that adulteration is more easily covered up and in the further fact that, owing to the large amount of pepper used, the gain is much greater.
The quality of a ground pepper can be told by an expert from its weight and color, and on examination with a lens of low magnifying power. The particles are not coarsely ground, and it is not difficult to pick out pieces of husk, yellow corn, and rice; if necessary, a more careful investigation under a microscope of higher power will serve for confirmation. Black pepper is much more liable to be adulterated than the white, although it is perfectly easy to dilute the latter with broken rice or cracker dust, or with long pepper. There is a disposition many times on the part of those who can afford it to have the best that can be made, in appearance at least, and it is thought by some that the whiter the color of the pepper the purer the quality. This is a great mistake. The removing of the outer covering of the black in order to make white pepper removes the most pungent part of the fruit. This work is sometimes carried so far that, while the fruit, when ground, is nearly as white as starch, there is little left but starch. It is questioned whether this practice is not as much an adulteration as the skimming of milk, as it takes away the most valuable part of the fruit. Long pepper is also used to adulterate pepper, but the taste and smell of the long pepper cannot be disguised, and its starch is nearly double the size of that of ordinary black pepper. Not only are the pepper shells used to adulterate ground pepper, but also other by-products, such as middlings, wheat, corn, ground olive stones, cocoanut shells, almond shells, mustard hulls, long pepper, Cayenne pepper, sago, and linseed.
These are sold to the spice grinders under the name of “P. D.” pepper. Pepper adulterants and pepper mixtures,—P. D., pepper dust; H. P. D., hot pepper dust; W. P. D., white pepper dust—consist of such products as the grinder has at hand or can obtain at the lowest price, the mixer requiring only that the colors shall be such as are suitable for his trade. In London, the olive stones are much used, put up in colors of both black and white. Pepper mixtures are sold under the name of “Poivrette or Pepperette.” Their natural color is pale buff, much resembling the middle layer of the pepper berry when ground, and they cannot be distinguished from the pepper by the eye, even with the use of a hand lens, when mixed with a powdered pepper, but with the aid of the microscope with one-sixth or one-eighth objective, it is seen that they consist of pale, dense, lignous cells, being entire and marked with linear air spaces; some are torn and indistinct. Other substances examined showed finely ground clay and brick dust. The presence of pepper husks and charcoal is generally known by the immensely increased proportion of black particles in the field, as appears in [Fig. 43], opposite page 25, Chap. III.
The true pepper powder, and one in which rice starch is present, is given in [Fig. 21] and in [Fig. 42], which also gives us an idea of the size of the pepper starch, which is very small as compared with any other kind of starch. Much authority might be quoted on the adulterations of pepper, but enough has been written to give the reader an idea of its vastness. I will next endeavor to give the method of examining peppers microscopically. First, the sieve examination of those particles left upon a forty to sixty-mesh sieve is of value. This examination will frequently reveal the nature of the adulterant or the too large portion of pepper husk.
Next, by the aid of a good dissecting microscope, fifteen to thirty power, the frequency of the occurrence of the coarse particles, after a little experience, will not be difficult to sort out, and the presence of sand or a notable excess of P. D. may be detected and estimated. Backgrounds of white and black with reflected light and afterwards transmitted light may be used in the manner so conveniently afforded by Zeiss’s stand made for this purpose. A portion of the powdered pepper or the separated coarse particles should also be treated with a chloral-hydrate solution for twenty-four hours, to render it more transparent for examination with higher powers, and in the meantime a part of the coarse particles collected from the sieve may be examined under a one and one-half inch objective and then crushed and re-examined, using both plain and polarized light. In this way husky matter may be distinguished and foreign starches rejected. Polarized light is then the means of bringing out more plainly the starches, the proportion of which iodine will reveal. Due allowance should be made for the smaller granules of pepper starch and all optically active tissue, such as the fibers and sclerenchyma or stone cells, which are found in olive stones and cocoanut shells. The chloral-hydrate preparation should now be examined, much of which disappears, and the starch is found much swollen. The structure of the pepper itself has already been explained and is supposed to be so well understood that it cannot be confused with the foreign matter, as the husky matter present is rendered so much clearer that its identification and differentiation are much easier. Experience with half a dozen samples of cheap, in comparison with a pure, pepper will soon teach one the best means of making out what has been briefly described.
It has been found most valuable to digest about a gram of pepper with nitric acid, specific gravity 1.1, and chlorate of potash for several hours, or until the color is bleached, when it is then possible to distinguish the denser cellular structure more easily than in any other way. This is particularly true of the stone cells, which make up the larger part of the cocoanut shells and ground olive stones, especially when polarized light is used. Care should be taken not to confuse the stone cells of the pepper husk with those of olive stones or other adulterants. Charcoal at the same time remains unbleached. The analyst will find many variations in the samples met with and should always be on guard for something new.
Chemical composition of black pepper.—The analysis of the pure ground pepper shows the amount of water to be between 8 and 10 per cent., but, of course, it varies with surrounding conditions. The ash in black peppers does not exceed from 4-10 to 7-10 per cent., and in white, 4-10 per cent.; it is fair to believe that anything above 5 per cent. for black and 2 per cent. for white is suspicious. The volatile oil, to which pepper owes its flavor, varies in black pepper from 1.69 to .70, and in white 1.26 to .57 are found, but this determination is not of great value as a means of detecting adulterations.
Piperine, which is a neutral crystalline substance, and resin, to which the pepper owes its pungency, of which it yields about two per cent. in its composition, are similar to oil of turpentine as well in specific gravity as in the boiling point. These substances furnish a most valuable check on the purity of both white and black pepper. Pepper contains from 7.90 to 7.24 per cent. of these substances, showing a great constancy in amount, and on addition of adulterants, this is plainly affected, which seems better than a determination of pure piperine, which is difficult and causes much loss. It has also proved impossible to make determinations of piperine by the combustion, or K. Jeldahl, methods by application of Stutzer’s copper-hydrate process, the percentage of nitrogen being so small, 4.912 in piperine, as to make the error very large when converting the former to the latter, the necessary factor being 20.36.
The determination of starch or its equivalent in reducing sugars has been looked into with care, and a preliminary extraction with alcohol and water is necessary to obtain results which are fairly constant, which determination shows black pepper to contain from 34 to 38 per cent. of starch, or 42 to 47 per cent. of substances of reducing sugar equivalent, calculated on dry ash free substance. White pepper contains in the same way from 40 to 43 per cent. starch and gives from 50 to 55 per cent. of reducing sugar equivalent on dry ash free substance.
The crude fiber in black pepper does not vary far from 10 per cent., but in the white pepper is much reduced, depending to a certain extent on the perfection of the decortication. Four to 8 per cent. are probably fair limits, and this determination is quite necessary in revealing the presence of foreign woody or fibrous matter.
Albuminoids do not vary widely, 10 per cent. being the average, with extremes of 7.69 and 11.50. The addition of nitrogenous seeds, of course, increases the amount, and of fibrous or woody matter diminishes it. We have the following result as a standard:
| Water, | 8.0 to 11.0 |
| Ash, | 2.75 to 5.0 |
| Volatile Oil, | .50 to 1.75 |
| Pepperine and Resin, | 7.0 to 8.0 |
| Starch, | 32.0 to 38.0 |
| Crude Fiber, | 8.0 to 11.0 |
| Albuminoids, | 7.0 to 12.0 |
CHAPTER V
WHITE PEPPER
WHITE pepper is thought by many to be produced by a separate plant, but it is the fruit of the black pepper vine, the change in appearance being brought about by artificial preparation. The poor natives are said to collect for market some white berries, which have been left on the vines until fully ripe and then have fallen to the ground and, by their exposure to the sun, have lost the outer black coating. That which remains is called the “genuine” white pepper. This collection of the white pepper corns by the natives has given rise to the story that a small bird called ballaree, feeding on the black pepper, digests nothing but the outer husks and, the balance, having passed whole through the organs of the bird, becomes white.
The pepper vines are injured by allowing the berry to ripen before gathering to make white pepper. For this reason the unripe fruit is often used, and some manufacturers make it a business to prepare or make the white pepper. The unripe black pepper is robbed of its outer coat, to make white pepper, in several ways, according to the extent to which the decorticating process is carried. Thus, we may have decorticated pepper from which all three coats are removed, or only one or two of them. All of these kinds are called factitious white pepper. Thus we have Tellicherry, which is particularly fine, and, second, the “coriander white,” so called from its close resemblance to the seed of that name. This is also a fine grade. It is made in imitation of the coriander seed by cutting off from the end of each corn a piece of the outer hull, so that the dark-colored inner portion shows. The ordinary white follows next, which is made from the Singapore, Penang, etc. This is often bleached to imitate the first two, but it makes a sad imitation.
The Tellicherry and coriander are packed in cases of about 200 pounds, each with marked tare on every case. The ordinary white is packed in bags of about 150 pounds, with 2 per cent. tare, with an allowance of one pound to each package.
The process is as follows: The black pepper may be kept in the house for several days and then bruised or washed in a basket to remove the stalk and pulpy matter, after which it is dried in the sunshine before shipping. It is also prepared by steeping in water in which it has been allowed fully to ripen and then removing the outer coat by friction. The natives also remove the outer layer by placing the ripest red grains in running water or in pits made near the river bank or in stagnant pools. Sometimes it is only buried in the ground, and when it has been under this treatment for about one week it will swell and burst the outer husk, which is then easily removed by rubbing with the hands while it is drying in the sunshine. After being winnowed it is ready for export. Another way of preparing white pepper, often used, is to place the black pepper in a solution of chloride of lime water to remove the dark coating, after which it is rubbed and dried as in the other preparation.
Although the white pepper has the name of being a superior article, it is not. It is very true that only the marrow of the black pepper berries can be used to make white pepper, and the product does have an exquisite flavor; but since the greater strength lies in the outer cover, there is some doubt as to the quality of the white pepper. Moreover, the real goodness of the pepper is, in fact, not improved by this process, as the water injures its strength, the outer husk contains more of the aroma, and the quality of the pepper removed is almost proportionate to the weight of the pepper corn. The only gain obtained is in the appearance, and this process is but another way of meeting the public demand for something to please the eye, instead of the palate.
White pepper brings a higher price to the grower, but when the waste and extra labor are considered it is seen that the grower’s profits are largely reduced.
White pepper corns allowed to ripen fully are larger than black and can be reduced to a powder more readily, and will present a more uniform appearance.
China and the Straits Settlement export much of the cheaper white pepper found in our market and much of it comes from the island of Rhio, and it is imported in the whole.
Chemical composition of white pepper:
| Water, | 8.0 to 11.0 |
| Ash, | 1.0 to 2.0 |
| Volatile Oil, | .50 to 1.75 |
| Piperine and Resin, | 7.0 to 8.0 |
| Starch, | 40.0 to 44.0 |
| Crude Fiber, | 4.11 to 8.0 |
| Albuminoids, | 8.0 to 10.0 |
By mixing one part ground white pepper with two parts of slacked lime and a sufficient quantity of water, and evaporating the solution to dryness in a water bath, the powder being exhausted with commercial ether, piperine can be obtained nearly pure in large crystals of a faint straw color.
To obtain it perfectly pure, it must be dissolved in alcohol and recrystallized.
LONG PEPPER (Piper Longum)
CHAPTER VI
LONG PEPPER
Long pepper is the fruit spike of a wild plant of Piper longum (Chavica Roxburghii) and of Piper (C. officinarum), there being two species—French, Poivre longue; German, Langer Pfeffer; Italian, Pepe lungo; Spanish, Pimienta larga; Javanese, Chabi-Jawa; Hindostan, Pipel; Cyngalese, Tipilie, elephant pepper; Cochin Chinese, Caylot.
LONG pepper (Piper officinarum) is a perennial plant and has oblong leaves attenuated at the base, and is a native of Indian Archipelago, Nepaul, and Java. It is found growing along the streams of the East Indies, Sumatra, Celebes, and Timor, and is also found in Malabar, Ceylon, and East Bengal, and in the Philippines, being indigenous to most of these countries. It is distinguished from the former by having cordate or heart-shaped leaves at the base, which are pinnate and five-veined.
In Bengal the plants are raised from suckers and are set five feet apart in rich, high, dry soil. Its stem is smooth with a slender branch and scandent leaves, cordate pointed and nerved, and of a deep-green color. The flowers are diœcious and small, in short, dense, terminal solitary spikes, which are nearly cylindrical and opposite to the leaves. They are very similar to black pepper, with some characteristic differences.
Long pepper appears to have been known by the ancient Greeks and Romans, and in the tenth century mention is made of long pepper or Macro-piper.
The minute baccate fruit, which is closely packed around the central axis, is at first green, becoming red when ripe. The peppers are hottest in their immature state and are then gathered and dried in the sunshine, when they change to a dark gray color. They are imported in the spikes which have the appearance of being limed. They are about one and one-half inches in length by one-fourth inch thick, but vary in size and are indented on the surface. The yield from an acre is three maunds of eighty pounds the first year, twelve the second year, and eighteen the third year, after which the yield diminishes. The roots are finally grubbed up and dried and sold as “pi pli mul,” which is a favorite medicine of the Hindoos, who use it for palsy and apoplexy. The infusion of the powdered fruit mixed with a little honey is said to be good in catarrhal affection, when the chest is loaded with phlegm.
In structure it does not bear a close resemblance to black pepper, as its pepper corns, or berries, and husks all harden together on a long, central, irregular, climbing stem, much in the same way that in the pines the seed and covering are all hardened into one cone. It not only has more woody fiber but brings with it much more sand, which is found imbedded in the crevices of the irregular fruit, than is found in ordinary pepper. Long pepper is a spice often called for during the fall season for pickling. It imparts a flavor to pickles which causes a demand for it for preserving purposes. There is much old stock on the market, which is poor. This is often used to adulterate ordinary pepper, but it can be readily detected by its disagreeable odor, which warmth will develop, and by its slaty color and the amount of sand it contains. Although grinders try to destroy the odor by bleaching, and the slaty color by sifting out the husk to make it lighter, its characteristics cannot be covered up in the true pepper.
In gathering the long pepper, the native, being paid by the weight for what he brings to the market, takes care not to less the weight of dirt, but rather to increase it, and in consequence we find that it has always from 3 to 7 per cent. of insoluble sand and clay in addition to the proper ash of the fruit. It is impossible to clean it as pepper should be cleaned for grinding, except with difficulty and by hand.
The pepper is harvested in January and when thoroughly dry is put up in piculs of 135½ pounds each.
The ash of the long pepper contains a very large proportion of salts insoluble in hydrochloric acid, and when ground the hard husk and woody centers, as well as the dirt, are necessarily ground along with the minute berries. Although it contains more sand and more woody fiber than genuine ground pepper of the corresponding shade, it does not contain as much cellulose as the most husky black pepper.
Long pepper is always cheaper than the best black pepper and may be sold as long pepper on the market without offense, but it has no more right to a place on the market as black pepper than has any other admixture, and as such is as fraudulent as buckwheat meal and is just as objectionable.
A sure test for long pepper as an adulterant in ground black pepper is to heat a piece of cold meat between two plates and sprinkle some of the suspected fresh long pepper on it, when the smell and flavor will be so offensive that one will feel obliged to reject the meat. The presence of long pepper may be determined by the following characteristics:
1. If much long pepper is used, its peculiar slaty color will show, although sifting and bleaching will partly hide the color; but the odor of the mixture when warmed is unmistakable to an educated olfactory sense, even if the amount of mixture be moderate. The odor cannot be destroyed by bleaching, for that has been tried, and even the ethal as well as the alcoholic extracts from which the solvent has been evaporated at a low temperature yields, when warmed, the characteristic odor very plainly. Admixture of long pepper would also introduce much sand in the powdered black pepper, and in white pepper it would be much more noticeable, as white pepper does not contain 2½ per cent. of sand and more would mean an admixture. There being also much woody matter in powdered long pepper, arising from the smallness of the berries as well as the hardened setting and from the central woody tube, this may be detected either by chemical analysis or by microscope, and some of it by the naked eye or with the aid of a large hand lens. If the sample be spread out in a smooth, thin layer on strong paper by means of an ivory paper knife, pieces of fluffy woody fiber will be detected, especially if the thin layer be tapped lightly from below. These pieces come from the central part of the indurated catkin, which cannot be completely ground fine as genuine pepper stalks are ground. Much of this matter is removed by the grinder’s sieves, but enough pass through the meshes of the silk to be useful as a corroborative indication, and if any particles of husk pass through they can be told from those of the genuine pepper husks.
A proportion of the starch granules of long pepper is of larger size, about .0002 inch, and of angular shape, very slightly smaller than rice granules and more loosely aggregated in clusters or isolated. Here it is necessary to notice that the statement is made in books that genuine pepper starch is round in form. Pepper starch is doubtless round in the main, but not invariably. (See [illustration].) The loose granules of the interior are spherical, but in the dense portions of the berry they become more angular by pressure on each other.
Chemical composition of long pepper:
| Total ash, | 8.91 |
| Sand and ash matter converted into sugar, H. C. L., | 1.2 |
| Total matter soluble in 10 per cent. of H. C. L., | 67.83 |
| Starch and matters convertible into sugar, | 44.04 |
| Albuminous matter soluble in alkali, | 15.47 |
| Cellulose, | 15.70 |
| Extracted by alcohol, | 7.7 |
| Extracted by ether, | 5.5 |
| Nitrogen, | 2.1 |
Long pepper also contains piperine, resin, and volatile oil.
The principal cities of export are Singapore and Penang, the annual amount of export being from 2,000 to 3,000 piculs of 135½ pounds each from each city at a London market value of 37 to 45s. a cwt.
CAPSICUM OR CAYENNE
1 Zanzibar
2 Bombay
3 Sierra Leone
4, 5, 6 and 7 Common Garden
CHAPTER VII
CAPSICUM, OR CAYENNE
CAYENNE pepper, Guiana pepper, Spanish pepper, Mexican chilli, as it is often called, more commonly spoken of as red pepper, is a genus of herbs or shrubs of the nightshade family (Salanaceoe) the fruit of any species of capsicum. The name capsicum is of uncertain origin, perhaps from kato, to bite—all of them having a strong, pungent flavor, or from L. capso, box or chest, from the shape of the fruit; the latter name being given to it by Broconna.
ANNUUM HERBACEOUS OR SUFFRUTESCENT
The true peppers are members of a totally distinct order, the Piperaceoe.
French, Piment or Corail des Jardins Poivra d’Inde or Guinee; German, Spanisher Oderkerscher Pfeffer.
Cayenne takes its name from the city of Cayenne (Koyen or Kien) (see [illustration]), or from the island and river, both of same name, on which it is located, or from the province of Cayenne in French Guiana, South America. The city of Cayenne is a French penal station, and exports large quantities of Cayenne, which we call Guiana pepper.
Probably the first known history of Cayenne pepper in Europe is that given by Martyr, who writes of Columbus bringing it home with him in 1493, and speaks of it as being more pungent than that from Caucasus, probably referring to the Oriental black pepper. About a century later, Gerarde writes of its being brought into Europe from Africa and Southern Asia and being grown in European gardens. Probably the first record of its use is that given by Doctor Chauca, who was physician with Columbus’s fleet in 1494, and who alludes to it as a condiment used in dressing meats, dyeing, and other purposes, as well as a medicine.
Cayenne pepper is supposed to have first been brought to America by the Portuguese, who found it growing in a wild state. Our greater supply now comes from Zanzibar, Nepaul, Bombay, and Penang. Almost every gardener knows the red pepper plant. The plants are generally started in a nursery or hot-house in early spring, from the seed, and are transplanted when a few inches high, as soon as the weather will permit, in the prepared garden, about four feet apart. When about six inches high, a little rich fertilizer should be worked in the soil about the plants. The Cayenne pepper plant is an annual and is a slow grower, and it seldom rises higher than four feet. It has a rough stem, nearly globulous, with branches diffused and often scandent; the leaves are lancelate, quite entire and repand, small, smooth, petioled, alternate in pairs or near each other, greenish-white flowers, seldom violaceous; solitary or in twos and threes with rotate five, rarely six or seven, cleft corolla; stamens, five, and rarely six or seven, with five bluish anthers (connivent and dehising longitudinally) and an obtuse stigma, calyx usually embracing base of ovary, which soon becomes a pod, consisting of a fleshy envelope at first and afterwards a leathery, oblong, linear, juiceless pod or fruit, in which are the spongy pulp and seeds. These fruit pods are of several varieties, varying in shape and color, and being long or short, podded and oval, round or heart-shaped. The pods are bright red or yellow, divided into two or three cells full of small white seeds, known as pod pepper. The pods which are of a green color, when full grown, commence to change first to a lovely canary yellow and then to a rose pink, and so on through the different shades until they are intense scarlet when ready for harvesting in August and September (see [illustration]).
Don gives a list of thirty-three varieties in his General System of Gardening and Botany, which are used to make Cayenne pepper, but there are ninety different species of capsicum known, and ranging in height from a small plant of six inches to ornamental plants six feet in height, and of many varieties or species of capsicum too contribute to that found in commerce.
The C. frutescens of the Fastigiatum (perennial) sometimes reaches to a height of several feet with branching and spreading tops, sometimes decumbent, leaves broadly ovate, fruit of various shapes and colors, usually small and very pungent, borne on long peduncles and is the species which is officinal in both the British and United States Pharmacopœias. It grows in tropical Africa and America and is called Zanzibar pepper, and often by the name of Mexican chillies, and is of a high grade of Cayenne ([Fig. 1]). Its pods are very small, being from one-half to three-fourths inch long and very bright red, containing white seeds, the skin of the pods being tender and very pungent. The color of its powder is lighter yellow than C. annum, has a fibrous root system. Potato and tomato belonging to the same family, it is found growing in the United States and Europe and has been growing in English gardens since 1548 and, although indigenous to South America, is now cultivated in India, Hungary, Italy, and Turkey.
Nepaul capsicum (or Nepal and Nipal), as it is sometimes called, has an odor and flavor resembling orris and a pod the color of amber when dried. It is most esteemed as a condiment, being aromatic and appetizing, and not so acrid or biting as is most Cayenne. It is found cultivated on the mountain side in Hindoostan.
Cayenne of the African variety comes from Sierra Leone in the east and from Natal, southeast of Cape Colony, including Zululand and Tangaland, or from a territory that has a coast line of 300 miles. It grows to a height of five or six feet producing long, kidney-shaped, orange-colored pods. It is shipped from the port of Natal. It is considered the best for fluid extract. That from Sierra Leone ([Fig. 3]) has pods that are small, conical-pointed, and less than one inch in length. It is very pungent, and when reduced to powder is a light brownish yellow with a peculiar odor and somewhat aromatic. It is stronger in the powder than in the dry fruit, and to the taste is bitterish, acrid, and burning, producing, a fiery sensation in the mouth, which continues for a long time. There is a new Cayenne on the market of recent date, called Mombassa, from the city of the same name in Africa.
CAYENNE
Bombay Cayenne ([Fig. 2]) has large pods, from two to three inches long, which when dry become flat in shape and of a pale-red color. It is not so fine flavored or pungent as the Zanzibar and is of less value.
The true Mexican chillies are grown mostly in Frantera de Tabasco, Mexico, the name being much used for Cayenne chillies from other countries, as has been mentioned.
The smaller varieties (C. baccatum) have been known in the English gardens since 1731; plants, small and very erect, and slender branches, fastigiate, flexous; corolla, small, spreading about one-half an inch, and has a globular fruit called cherry or berry capsicum, and are usually known as the “chillies” or “bird pepper.” They are not more than one-half to three-quarters of an inch while the C. annuum is two to three inches long.
C. fastigiatum (minimum) which is usually termed the shrubbery capsicum and by Rheede is called capo-malago, is found growing wild in South India and is extensively cultivated in tropical Africa and America. It is three to six feet high with prominently angled or somewhat channeled stem and loosely spreading or trailing branches; leaves broadly ovate and acuminate, three to six inches long and two to three and one-half inches wide; peduncles, slender and one to two inches long in pairs, usually longer than the fruit; calyx, cup-shaped, embracing base of fruit; corolla, often with acherous markings in the throat; fruit, red, obtuse or oblong, acuminate, three-fourths to one and one-fourth inches long, and one-fourth to three-fourths of an inch in diameter, and very acrid.
C. annuum (Longum crossum), bell-shaped, of Algeria, which are often spoken of as herbaceous, and by Rheede as vallia capo-malago, the difference being chiefly in the nature of the stem.
It is two feet high with few branches and very large leaves, often three to five inches long, and sometimes caricous, lower ones usually pendant petioles, deeply channeled; peduncles, about one inch long; corolla, large and spreading seven-eighths to one and one-fourth inches; fruit, large, oblate, oblong or truncated, three to four-lobed, usually with basal depressions, more or less sulcate and rugose; flesh, thick, firm and mild flavor.
The Minimum in Hindoostan is named “Dhan Nurich.” The C. grossum bears fruit as large as a small apple and is called by the English in India coffrie chillie. It is preferred for pickling, the seed being first removed. The skin is fleshy and tender.
C. fasciculatum has few branches and clustered leaves or crowded in branches about the summit, elliptical, lanceolate, pointed at both ends; fruit clustered erect, slender, about three inches long, one-fourth inch in diameter, very acrid and is the red cluster pepper.
Acuminatum (C. chilense), herbaceous, very branchy, about two and one-half feet high, becoming a dense mass of foliage; flowers, medium size, spreading one-half to three-fourths inch; fruit, larger than C. fasciculatum.
C. cerasiforme has leaves medium ovate, oblong, acuminate, about one and one-fourth to three and one-half inches long; calyx seated on base of fruit; corolla, large and spreading seven-eighths to one and one-half inches; fruit, one-half to one-eighth inch thick, spherical, subcordate, oblate or occasionally obscurely pointed, or slightly elongated, smooth, or, rarely, minutely rugose or sulcate; extremely pungent, and cherry yellow.
Tetragomum, or bonnet pepper, is a species much esteemed in Guiana, which bears very large, handsome, fleshy fruit, two colors, scarlet and golden yellow; and C. frutescens (spur or goat pepper) has been growing in the English gardens since 1856, is said to yield most of the Cayenne pepper which comes from the West Indies and South America; largely used in salads.
A kind called tobacco pepper is said to possess the most pungent properties of any of the species. It yields a small red pod generally less than an inch in length, and is longitudinal in shape, mostly borne above the leaves, and is so exceedingly hot that a small quantity of it is sufficient to season a large dish of any food.
Owing to its oleaginous character it has been found impossible to preserve it by drying, but by pouring strong boiling vinegar on it a sauce or decoction can be made which will possess in a concentrated form all the essential qualities of the vegetable, a single drop being enough to flavor a whole plate of soup or food.
The chilli plant is the Lat-tsiao of Cochin Chinese. It is constantly found in its wild state in the eastern islands. These varieties are enumerated by botanists; their fruits differ in degrees of pungency. All capsicum is a low grade of Cayenne. It requires but the simplest culture, and cultivation appears to increase the size of the fruit, but it diminishes its pungency.
Several varieties of C. annuum have little or no pungency. One of these is abundantly grown in Austria-Hungary, from which we obtain Paprika of the Magyars. Another kind is imported into this country from Spain in a powder for feeding birds to improve the colors of their feathers and to make them sing.
There are growing in the botanical gardens of Calcutta six species of capsicum, viz, annuum, grossum, frutescens, baccatum, purpureum, and minimum. The grossum in Hindoostan is called “Kaffrie Murich” and of the frutescens there are two varieties, the red and the yellow, called by the Bengalese “lall-lunka,” “Murich” and “huldi-lunka” Murich. The Cyngalese name for frutescens is Casnairis. There is said to be a black pod as well as a red and yellow known on the Island of Ceylon.
The consumption of chillies in India is immense, as they are used by both rich and poor and constitute the principal seasoning for the poor in their rice. The natives of the West Indies, Africa, and Mexico use them very extensively.
West India stomachic man-drum is prepared by washing a few pods of bird’s pepper and mixing them with sliced cucumber and shallots, to which add a little lime juice or Madeira wine.
A great quantity of agri or Guiana pepper is grown in Peru, a variety which the natives are very fond of as a condiment. It is not uncommon for an American Indian to make a meal of twenty to thirty pods of capsicum and a little salt and a piece of bread washed down with chica, their popular beverage.
The wort, or Cayenne pottage, may be termed the national dish of the Abyssinians, as that, or its basis, “dillock,” is almost always eaten with their ordinary diet. Equal parts of salt and well-powdered red Cayenne pod are mixed together with a little pea or bean meal to make a paste which is called dillock. This mixture is made in quantities at a time, being preserved in a large gourd shell, generally suspended from the roof. The wort is merely a little water added to the paste, which is boiled over the fire with the addition of a little fat meat. More meal is added to make a kind of porridge, to which sometimes are also added several warm seeds, such as the common cress or black mustard. Sometimes the larger peppers are harvested when full grown, while yet green in color, to be used for mangoes by removing the seeds and stuffing with chow-chow pickles. Cayenne may be considered one of the most useful vegetables in hygiene as a stimulant and auxiliary in digestion and has been considered invaluable in warm climates. It is used medicinally for various ailments in form of tinctures, as a rubefacient and stimulant, especially in case of ulcerated sore throat and also dropsy, colic, and toothache; when mixed with honey and applied externally is a good remedy for quinsy. It is also used for tropical fevers, for gout and paralysis. It acts on the stomach as an aromatic condiment and when preserved in acetic acid it forms chilli vinegar. When the seed of the chillies or capsicum is fresh it has a penetrating, acrid smell, and this irritant property which prevails obscures the narcotic action. Its acridity is owing to an oleaginous substance called capsicine, and this extremely pungent principle produces a most painful burning in the mouth. Capsicum or chillies is generally imported in bales of 130 pounds each and occasionally is bottled in vinegar when green or ripe. In the large factories a special mill is usually reserved for powdering Cayenne exclusively, instead of burr-stone mills with the ordinary shaking sifter. A high-speed iron plate mill is often used, and in connection with this a large revolving reel is required for sifting the spice as it is ground. The coarse part or tailings are returned to the mill automatically by means of a suitable, connected-bucket elevator. A special grinding outfit of this kind can be arranged so that it does not require much attention from the workman, a device which is very essential, as the fine powder works into the skin and great care must be used in handling the goods. Small grinders prefer to buy it powdered from the large factories. Sometimes the powdered Cayenne pepper is adulterated by mixing with wheat flour and made into cakes with yeast and baked hard like biscuit, then they are ground and sifted.
PUBLIC BUILDINGS, BOMBAY
A MADRAS FAMILY
As the children marry, they build an addition to the old home
The pericarp consists of two layers, the outer being composed of yellow, thick-walled cells; the inner layer is twice as broad and exhibits a soft, shrunken parenchyma, traversed by their fibro-vascular bundles. The cells of the outer layer are especially the seat of the fine granules of coloring matter, which contain a fat or oily substance, as may be found if they are removed by alcoholic solution of potash.
The structural details of this fruit afford interesting subjects for microscopical investigation. The peculiarities described are so distinctive that the presence of foreign matter is easily detected. The cells of the pericarp or epidermis are of a peculiar flattened and chain-like angular form, which are characteristic of Cayenne. The other structures are not as prominent, but are not liable to be confounded with those of any adulterants. Diagrammatic representatives of this structure are given in [Fig. 45], Chap. III, and the appearance of the pure ground Cayenne under polarized light in [Fig. 44].
The portions of the seed in the powder are not readily distinguished without careful examination. They are, however, characteristic and contain starch, the form of which is shown in [Fig. 20], Chap. III. The adulterants used are mineral coloring matter to hide the loss of color, which takes place on exposure of Cayenne to light, and for added weight ground rice, tumeric, husk of mustard, etc. Rice and corn flour adulterations are shown in [Fig. 45], which cannot be confused with the few starch grains found in the lower layer of the pericarp or in the seed. The tumeric and mustard are recognized by their peculiar structure.
The chemical composition of capsicum is (1) a fixed oil without sharp smell or taste and which is almost entirely in the seed; (2) a camphor-like substance which tastes and smells sharp, and which contains the peculiar principle of Cayenne (capsicine); this principle is found both in the pod and in the seeds, but in greater quantity in the pod; (3) a resinous body, the red coloring matter (capsicum red), which is found only in the pod.
In the detection of the adulterations of Cayenne by chemical methods, determination of water and ash, ether extracts and albuminoids are of value, and as a rule when combined with a microscopic examination will reveal the means and amounts of adulterations without difficulty.
Chemical composition of Capsicum annum, water at 100 degrees:
| Seed | Pod | Whole Fruit | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Water at 100 deg., | 8.12 | 14.75 | 11.94 |
| Albuminoids, | 18.31 | 10.69 | 13.88 |
| Fat (ether extract), | 28.54 | 5.48 | 15.26 |
| Nitrogen, free extract by difference | 21.33 | 38.73 | 32.63 |
| Crude Fiber, | 17.50 | 23.75 | 21.09 |
| Ash, | 3.20 | 6.62 | 5.20 |
| Total, | 97.00 | 100.00 | 100.00 |
| Nitrogen, | 2.93 | 1.71 | 2.22 |
PIMENTO OR ALLSPICE
1 Garden Allspice
2 Wild Allspice
CHAPTER VIII
PIMENTO, OR ALLSPICE
WHAT’S in a name? That which we call allspice by any other name would have as fine a flavor.
Pimento officinalis (Myrtus Eugenia pimenta), an order of Jamaica Pepper (Icasandria Monogyia).
Pimenta vulgaris myrtaceae. (These are names applied to the immature fruit of pimento.)
Spanish name, Pimento.
French, Piment des Anglais Toute epice Poivre de la Jamiaque.
German, Nelkenpfeffer, Nelkenkopfe, Neugewurz.
The pimento tree belongs to the myrtle family and is one of the most beautiful trees known as an evergreen. It grows to a height of from twenty to thirty feet and occasionally it reaches a height of forty feet. It is slender, straight, and upright, with many branches at its top. The trunk is covered by a smooth, gray, or ashen-brown aromatic bark which peels off in flakes as the tree grows. The leaves are opposite, stalked from four to six inches long, and are oblong, lanceolate, and somewhat tapering. The petioles are blunt and rather emarginated at the apex, and entire, smooth on both surfaces, with deep-green, pale, and minute glands, dotted beneath, with the midrib prominent. They are particularly aromatic when fresh, abounding in essential oil which is the aromatic property of all kinds of fragrant fruits.
This tree is a native of the West Indies, and is found most abundantly on the limestone hills on the Island of Jamaica. It is the only common spice having its origin in the New World. It is found, but not in abundance, in most of the West India Islands, as well as in Mexico, Costa Rica, and Venezuela. It takes its name, pimento, from the Spanish word for pepper. This name was given to it by early explorers of the New World because of its resemblance to pepper corn. It is called allspice because of the combination, or of the supposed combination, of various flavors.
Some writers have claimed that it is a child of Nature, and that it defies cultivation, but this is a mistake, as may be seen by comparing the illustrations of the garden berry ([Fig. 1]) with those of the wild berry ([Fig. 2]). It is seldom cultivated, however, and it is found at its best growing wild 6,000 feet above the sea and very near the coast line, on a poor rocky lime or chalky soil, with a very shallow surface mold.
The tree will not do well in a clay or sandy or marshy soil, but the soil must be kept well drained, and a hot, dry climate is the best. Since the pimento seeds are scattered by birds, the trees are found in greater or less numbers in many parts of the Island of Jamaica. They sometimes are found in groups of from five to twenty, and again in great forests. It is the predominating tree on the island and is seldom found alone.
After the tree has obtained a certain growth the underbrush and other wood, with some of the pimento trees, are cut out, leaving the trees from twenty to twenty-five feet apart, as they will not yield so well if left closer. It is in this way that the beautiful pimento walks (Pi-men-to-wak) are formed which we read of in Jamaica.
The pimento tree flowers twice each year, in July and April, but it bears only one crop annually and begins to bear when three years old, and arrives at maturity at seven years, when it abundantly repays the patience of the planter.
In July the tree is covered with small greenish-white fragrant flowers of four reflected petals. The flowers are in bunches or trichotomous panicles at the extremities of the branches with a calyx divided into four roundish segments. The filaments are numerous and longer than the corolla, spreading, and of the same color as the petals, supporting roundish white anthers. The style is short and single and erect with an obtuse stigma. As the tree branches symmetrically, and has a very luxuriant foliage, its rich green leaves and profusion of small white flowers give a very handsome appearance. The air is freighted with its fragrance for quite a long distance, and every breeze which disturbs its branches conveys the delicious odor.
The fruit which appears soon after the blossoms, is a smooth, glossy, succulent, globular berry, from two-tenths to three-tenths of an inch in diameter, or about the size of a small pea. Planters do not allow the berries to ripen fully, because in that case they would be difficult to cure and would become black and tasteless, losing their aromatic property. When the berries have their full size in the month of August, though yet green in color, they are gathered.
The harvesting is done by hand, by breaking off the twigs and stems which bear the berries. These are placed on a raised wooden floor or terrace to dry on mats for from seven to twelve days in the sunshine. Great care should be taken to turn them, so as to expose them fully to the sun, to prevent their quality being injured by moisture. Some planters dry them in kilns.
The one who removes the berries from the trees keeps three persons busy gathering them below, who are usually women or children. Care must be taken to separate, as far as possible, all ripe berries from those which are green, as otherwise the crop will be made of inferior quality. The fruit, which necessarily ripens on the tree, before the bulk of the crop is harvested, falls to the ground and is of no commercial value, as it has lost its aromatic properties. The problem which the planter has to contend with of harvesting his crop before it ripens is a serious one, for the harvesting often must be done rapidly, and it is often difficult to obtain help enough among the indolent natives to pick the crop. Thus many thousand pounds often go to waste. In wet weather the system of smoking is sometimes adopted for drying. The proper degree of dryness is ascertained by the wrinkled appearance and by the dark or reddish-brown color of the spice and the rattling noise made by the seeds when they are shaken. When the berries begin to dry they are frequently laid in cloths to preserve them from the dews. They are exposed to the sun’s rays every day and removed under cover every evening until sufficiently dry. They lose one-third of their weight in drying. The breaking of the branches in gathering the fruit answers to a rude kind of pruning. The crop is very abundant, some trees yielding as high as 150 pounds of green or 100 pounds of dried berries.
ISLAND OF JAMAICA WEST INDIES
Pimento is exported chiefly from Kingston, Jamaica, in 120 to 130-pound bags. About one-third of the crop comes to the United States; most of the balance goes to England, whence it is exported to other countries. The pimento del tobasco tree, a native of Mexico, produces a larger berry than the true pimento, but it is less aromatic and is often used to adulterate the allspice of commerce, but the true pimento is so cheap that it is adulterated but very little. The pimento is ground on common burr stones. It is used for medicinal purposes to prevent the taste of nauseous drugs, and it stimulates and gives tone to the stomach. It is sometimes used in tanning some kinds of leather. The small trees are used for walking-sticks and for umbrella handles. The berry is crowned with a persistent calyx of a black or dark-purple color when ripe, and when the four short thick sepals are rubbed off a scar is left like an elevated ring. At the other extremity of the fruit there is a shorter stalk attached.
The berry has a brittle, woody shell or pericarp, easily cut, of a dark ferruginous-brown color externally. The roughness on the surface is caused by the small essential oil receptacles. The berry is less aromatic than the pericarp. Its hull consists of a delicate epidermis of large thin-walled cells with light or dark red contents which are called portwine cells (see illustrations). [Fig. 46], Chap. III.
HARVESTING OF ALLSPICE
The fruit is two-celled, each cell containing a single flattish or kidney-shaped berry. The embryo is large and spirally curved, and the berry, when ripe, is filled with a sweetish pulp, which has then partly lost the aromatic property which it contained in the unripe state. The aroma is supposed to be a mixture of the aromas of nutmegs, cloves, and cinnamon.
The microscope shows that the outer layer of the pericarp just beneath the epidermis contains, with its collection of brown cells, an interior mass of fibro-vascular bundles traversing a mass of tissues of constructed parenchymous-walled cells, containing resin and tannin and small crystals of calcic oxalates. The seed contains much starch in minute grains, and yields from 3 per cent. to 4¼ per cent. of volatile oil, by distillation. This oil is composed mainly of eugenol C10H12, and very closely resembles the oil of cloves in all respects, but in odor, the difference being in the nature of the sesquialteral accompanying the eugenol. Its specific gravity is 1.04 to 1.05 at 15 degrees C. The yield of oil from the leaves is nearly 1 per cent.
Polarized light is a most important aid in examining powdered allspice, as it brings out strongly the stone cells and ligneous tissue ([Fig. 1], Chap. III), and differentiates these from the great mass of other matter. It also makes the oil cavities distinct.
It is hard to give a true chemical composition of pimento, but a good understanding of the tannin should be known, and especially a good estimation of the volatile oil. The amount of ash found in pimento is about 6 per cent. in the whole and 5 per cent. in the powdered state.
The chemical composition of a sample of whole pimento was found to be as follows:
| Water, | 6.19 |
| Ash, | 4.01 |
| Volatile Oil, | 3 to 4½ |
| Fixed Oil, | 6.15 |
| Crude Fiber, | 14.83 |
| Undetermined, | 59.28 |
| Albuminoids, | 4.38 |
| Nitrogen, | .70 |
| Tannin Equivalent, | 10.97 |
| Oxygen Required, | 2.81 |
The best adulterant is baked barley.
The specific gravity of the volatile oil is 1.04 to 1.05 at 15 degrees C.
Pimento meal loses its aromatic flavor very rapidly.
[[2]]The taste of allspice is warm, aromatic, pungent, and slightly astringent, and it imparts its flavor to water and all its virtue to alcohol. The infusion with water is of a brown color, and reddens litmus paper. Allspice yields volatile oil by distillation, a green fixed oil, a fatty substance in yellowish flakes, and tannin, gum, resin, sugar, coloring matter, malic and galic acids, saline matter, moisture and lignin.
[2]. State of Michigan, Dairy and Food Commission.
The green oil has the burning, aromatic taste of pimento, and is supposed to be the acrid principle. Upon this, therefore, together with the volatile oil, the active properties of the berries depend. The shell contains 10 per cent. of volatile oil, and perhaps a little chlorophyl.
Allspice is reported to contain an alkaloid having the odor of caneine. The volatile oil, which is used as a flavoring in alcoholic solution, is of a brownish-red, clear appearance, and has the odor and taste of pimento, but is warmer and more pungent. It is readily soluble in alcohol, and if two drops of the oil be dissolved in one fluid drachm of alcohol, and a drop of ferric chloride test solution be added, a bright-green color will be produced. If one C. C. of the oil be shaken with twenty C. C. of hot water it should not give more than a scarcely perceptible acid reaction with litmus paper.
If, after cooling, the liquid be passed through a wet filter, the clear filtrate will produce, with a drop of ferric chloride test solution, only a transient greyish green, but not a blue or violet color, a fact which indicates the absence of carbolic acid.
Pimento oil consists, like the oil of cloves, of two distinct oils, a light and heavy oil, separated by distilling the oil from caustic potassa. The light oil passes over, leaving the heavy oil behind, combined with the potassa. The heavy oil may be recovered by distilling the residue with sulphuric acid. The heavy oil has the acid property of combining with the alkalides, forming crystallized compounds, which is identical with the eugenol from the oil of cloves, from which is prepared the vanillin of commerce. Powdered allspice is often adulterated with clove stems, peas, almond shells, cracker dust, etc.
CINNAMON AND CASSIA
1 Ceylon
2 Batavia
3 Cassia Liguea
4 Java
5 Saigon
6 Cassia Liguea bud
7 Leaf stalk or flowering twig
CHAPTER IX
CINNAMON AND CASSIA
Robbed of your bark in masses large,
It’s sent abroad by ship and barge;
And India’s fragrance you bestow,
In summer climes and frigid snow.
THE cinnamon tree has been known to live two hundred years and its history is nearly as old as the history of man. It appears to have been the first spice sought after in all Oriental voyages, and is one of the few condiments that has been honored with a price that only the wealthy can buy. Both cinnamon and cassia are mentioned as precious odoriferous substances in the Masonic writings. Bible history mentions cinnamon at a very early date in Exodus, Chap. XXX, 23; in Proverbs, Chap. VII, 17; in Song of Solomon, Chap. IV, 14, being then introduced by the Phœnicians. It was likewise known to the Greeks and Romans under the name of kinnamomun. Vespasian, on his return from Palestine, dedicated to the Goddess of Peace, in one of the temples of the Capitol, garlands of cinnamon enclosed in polished gold, and in the temple built on Mount Palatine by the Empress Augusta in honor of Augustus Cæsar, her husband, was placed a root of the cinnamon tree set in a golden cup. It is recorded that two hundred and ten burthens of spice were consumed on the funeral pile of Sylla, and that Nero burnt at the obsequies of his wife, Poppæa, a quantity of cinnamon and cassia exceeding the whole importation of one year. Dr. Carl Schumann’s Kritische Untersuchungen über die Zimtländer, published as a supplement to Petermann’s Geographische Mitteilungen, is a most erudite contribution to history of geography and commerce. The author carefully examines the notices on cinnamon and cassia to be found in the writings of the ancients and of the Arabs, and critically examines these by the light of modern research. The ancient Egyptians procured their cinnamon from punt, which is identified with the Rego Cinnamonifera at the promontory of Garadafiri of the modern Somaliland. But neither cinnamon nor cassia was a product of this region, nor are they at the present time, which is amply proved and illustrated by a consideration of the geographical distribution of the Louracea. Arabian merchants intentionally shrouded in mystery their manner or place of obtaining cinnamon and, in consequence, the ancients entertained the most preposterous ideas on the subject.
The “Khisit” of the inscriptions of the temple of Doral Bahari is correctly translated cinnamon or cassia. The latter word and the gizi of Galen and the Keziah of the Hebrew are derived from it, but it is of itself a corruption of Kei-shi, the Chinese name for cassia. From this fact, the author concludes that China supplied the ancient world with most, if not all, of its cinnamon, but did so through traders settled in parts of Arabia or the Somali coast, who maintained their monopoly until the discovery of cinnamon in the Island of Ceylon.
Herodotus relates that cassia grew in Arabia, but that cinnamon was brought there by birds from India, the fabled birthplace of Bacchus. This writer states that cassia grew in a shallow lake, the borders of which were infested with winged animals resembling bats; that these were powerful creatures and uttered piercing cries; but that the Arabs made war against them for the purpose of obtaining the spice and, defending their eyes from the attack of the monsters, drove them from their stronghold for a brief period and then, unmolested, collected the cassia.
CEYLON
A still more marvelous account was given by a Grecian historian of the manner in which cinnamon was obtained, which is as follows: “The Arabs themselves were perfectly ignorant of the situation of the favored spots which produced this spice; some, however, asserted with much appearance of probability that it grew in the country where Bacchus was born, and they gave the following account of the plan resorted to for obtaining cinnamon: Some very large birds collected together a quantity of the shoots and small branches of the cinnamon and built their nests with it on the lofty mountains inaccessible to man; and the inhabitants of the country placed large pieces of carrion flesh near the haunts of the birds who bore it to their nests which, not being made strong enough to hold the additional load, gave way, falling to the valley below, where it was gathered up by the natives and exported to foreign lands.”
It was exported into India in the time of the authors of the Periplus of the Erythræan Sea, and even long before it was much used among masters of the ancient world.
Celsius recommends that it should be given “perparationem.” It is mentioned in the herb book of the Chinese Emperor Shen-nong, and was known in China 2,700 B. C. under the name of “Kwei” and was introduced into Egypt about 1,600 or 1,500 B. C., and China maintained her monopoly until the discovery of cinnamon on the Island of Ceylon. It would appear that cinnamon was not confined to Asia, much less to Ceylon, in former times. Ibn-Batuta is credited with having first mentioned the Island of Ceylon as a cinnamon region, for the Sayalan of Kazwini and Yakut is not Ceylon, as supposed by Colonel Yale and others, but Rami or Sumatra.
The Romans were supplied by the Arabs, the cinnamon being carried up the Nile in ships, then across the desert on camels to the Red Sea, which they crossed to a port of Arabia, where India merchants were met and exchanges took place, the cinnamon being the most important article of commerce from India, and in this way the odors of the far-famed cinnamon spice came, by poetical liberty, to be associated with “Araby the Blest” by the system of transit by caravans overland through Arabia.
The Romans communicated with India only once each year during the reign of Augustus, and at such times invested about £403,000 in the trade of cinnamon. They figured on about 100 per cent. profit. History tells us it was at one time sold in Rome at $25 per pound.
Even in comparatively modern times the products of the more eastern parts of Asia were chiefly imported into Europe by way of Egypt. The Venetians almost entirely controlled this lucrative branch of commerce, and through their hands these articles were supplied to the rest of Europe. But when the passage around the Cape of Good Hope was discovered by the Portuguese, in 1498, Indian commerce was turned into a different channel and the Portuguese soon supplanted the Venetians in the traffic of Indian commodities. Early in the sixteenth century they obtained permission from the powers of Ceylon to establish a factory on that island. Although the Europeans had obtained license from the ruling authorities to pursue this trade, the Arab merchants did not submit without a struggle to the intrusion. They vigorously opposed the landing of the strangers who were taking their trade away from them, but the Portuguese built the fort of Colombo and soon after made a treaty with the king of Kandy, by the terms of which the Portuguese agreed to assist the king of Kandy and his successors in all their wars and in return were to receive out of the Kandyan territory an annual supply of 124,000 pounds of cinnamon. The Dutch viewed with a jealous eye the rich and thriving Portuguese, and soon after they established themselves in the East Indies, and became desirous of monopolizing the cinnamon trade, they tried to undermine the Portuguese by showing favors to the king of Kandy, and in this way tried to have him drive the Portuguese from the island. The Dutch were partly successful in their bold attempt, as the king of Kandy, in 1612, agreed to sell the Dutch East India Company all the cinnamon that he could collect in his kingdom. The Portuguese, however, would not quietly submit, but after a long contesting of the matter it ended in 1645 in a treaty of peace with the Dutch, by which both nations were to share equally. During the time this treaty was in force both nations employed native cinnamon cutters to cut and prepare the aromatic bark, and all that was collected on either side was deposited in a central situation upon the river Dondegam, near Negombo. When the cinnamon harvest was completed an equal division of the quantity obtained was made, each party paying half the cost of harvesting. This amicable arrangement was not, however, of very long continuance, and in 1652 a fresh war proved more disastrous to the Portuguese, who were finally expelled from the Island of Ceylon in 1658. The Dutch now made strenuous efforts to obtain a monopoly of the cinnamon trade, and they also tried for the exclusive commerce of the Malabar coast. This was very expensive to the Dutch, as merchants of other countries, by paying a good price, were always able to obtain it from the natives notwithstanding the decrees of the princes of the country.
All through the Portuguese and Dutch periods, cinnamon was the principal source of wealth. The Dutch first tried cultivating it in 1767, thereby occasioning much fear on the part of the native Sinhalese that the cultivation would ruin the cinnamon forest. Previous to this time, in 1506, large trees were found by the Portuguese growing wild and scattered through the interior of Ceylon. The Dutch, after many attempts to restrict the cultivation of it to the Island of Ceylon, passed a law making the removal of the seed from the island a crime punishable by death. The law also provided that persons should be compelled to care for the tree, even if it were on their property, and it further provided that any person discovered in cutting a shrub of cinnamon on the island should have his right hand cut off. This law so retarded planting that up to 1808 or 1809 only 15,000 acres were cultivated. Exportation was restricted to 8,000 bales of 100 pounds each. In 1796, Ceylon was captured by the English. They put an end to these barbarous laws, but a monopoly was continued until 1832. Afterwards the cultivation of the tree was introduced by the Dutch into their own islands and the Malay Peninsula, an act which would have been much more creditable to the Dutch had they tried this means earlier, instead of warring with other countries.
It is estimated that the world’s production of true cinnamon does not exceed 400,000,000 pounds, while an equal amount of cassia is collected chiefly in China and the East Indies. Cinnamon is not an article which enters into the daily food of the masses of the people, and the consumption does not increase with a low price or decrease when the price is high. The present consumption does not equal one pound to each 500 inhabitants of the earth.
Cinnamon and cassia blume are the barks of several species of genus cinnamomum (natural order lauroceæ) and the true cinnamon, with which cassia is often compounded, is produced by cinnamomum Zeylanicum, formerly called Laurus, which is a member of the laurel family (French, Cannele de Ceylon; German, Zimmt Ceylon, Zimmt Kaneel; Arabic name, Kinsman).
The true cinnamon tree, if left in its natural states, varies in height and dimensions in different sections, growing to the height of twenty to forty feet with a straight trunk, and is from twelve to eighteen inches in diameter. It is the hardiest of any of the spice trees, and in its natural climate grows on almost any soil and at almost any elevation, with an average temperature of 85 degrees and an inch of rainfall for every degree. It may be grown by cultivation in any place where it is found growing wild. When sheltered from the wind and the direct rays of the hot sun, it will grow from 1,500 to 8,000 feet above the sea level. It is found in those angles of the mountains which face the monsoons. Where it is cultivated, it is cut back when six years old to about fifteen feet and every two years thereafter, and then has the general appearance of an orange tree. It is an evergreen with a beautiful scarlet foliage which changes to a dark glossy green.
The leaf and leaf stalk are globous and are nearly opposite, oblong, ovate, obtuse, the largest being from eleven to twelve centimeters in length and from five to seven centimeters in width. The leaf is coriaceous and shining bright green above and glaucous beneath. Besides the middle vein there are also two other veins on each side starting from the stalk, rounded to the shape of the edge of the leaf nearly to its extremity. The leaves on drying acquire a reddish-brown color due to the oxidation of the essential oil which they contain.
Small, dingy, white or greenish blossoms disposed in terminal panicles appear in January or February, their strong and unpleasant odor resembling a mixture of lilac and rose. In color they resemble mignonette. By May they develop into small, purplish, brown-colored berries enclosed at the base by a calyx and shaped like an acorn. The berry contains a soft brown pulp and has but one seed, which ripens in August and is gathered by the natives for the fragrant oil it contains.
The entire tree contains an aromatic flavor of cinnamon and no part of it is lost, as the entire tree is used for some purpose, every part of it having a distinct flavor. It is impossible to discover the cause or causes by means of which different qualities are produced from the same branch, since the shoots and the same tree are found to yield cinnamon of different qualities. The quality of a cinnamon tree is often determined by the size of the leaves, as well as by tasting the inner bark; the larger the leaf the better bark the tree will afford. The quality of the bark varies very much with local conditions, some being so inferior as to be harvested only for the purpose of adulterations. Two of these inferior varieties are the korahedi and the velli, the latter growing more quickly than any other cinnamon known, being often at two years’ growth four to five inches in girth and eight to ten feet high. It has a very coarse bark and takes its name from sand velli because it grits under the teeth. The bark is often so hard that it will turn the edge of a peeling knife. There are several varieties of cinnamon. Next in order after Ceylon are the following:
1. Penne or Rosse Kuroondu (which signifies honey or sweet cinnamon).
2. Naya Kuroondu (or snake cinnamon).
3. Kapooru Kuroondu (or camphor).
4. Kabatte Kuroondu (or astringent cinnamon).
5. Sevel Kuroondu (or mucilaginous cinnamon).
6. Dowool Kuroondu (flat or drum cinnamon).
7. Nika Kuroondu (or wild cinnamon, whose leaf resembles that of nicaso or vitex negundo).
8. Mal Kuroondu (or bloom or flower cinnamon).
9. Tompat K. (or trefoil cinnamon).
Only the first four are strictly varieties of the Laurus Cinnamomum, and as the names given are only known by the planters of cinnamon or by the native Sinhalese, I will not refer to them again except by the names known to commerce.
The true cinnamon is a native of the Island of Ceylon and it adds sweetness to the breezes which “blow softly o’er Ceylon’s Isle,” and nowhere else has it been found growing so well or so spontaneously. The large trees scattered through the older forests of the interior are every year gorgeous in bloom of every shade of pink from a faint rose to blood red. The Ceylon variety is the best in the world, and the product in 1904 was 9,216 hundreds, valued at $278,430. It grows up six or seven feet, like willows, and the twigs are cut down for exportation; the smaller the twigs the finer the quality.
The farm plantation is called a “Cinnamon Garden.” In Ceylon these gardens are the most famous in the world, the owners living like princes. Some of the carved wood in these homes are literally worth their weight in gold. There are certain trees and species that are taken in charge by the royal surgeons. Such have the official stamp indicating what their medical value is. This cinnamon commonly sells at $15 to $25 per pound and sometimes as high as $100. While the ordinary China cassia, handled by our grocers, sells at wholesale at six or seven cents a pound. The medicinal cassia, however, has about the value for cooking purposes that the ordinary Saigon cassia has. Many cinnamon gardens are being rooted up and planted to tea, however, as tea culture is more profitable. A sandy loam soil mixed with humus matter is favorable for the culture of cinnamon, and old, worn, coffee estates are often used in Ceylon for cinnamon plantations.
COLOMBO, CEYLON
A PLANTATION IN CEYLON
The cinnamon crop has few enemies. Cattle, goats, and squirrels eat the growing shoots while tender. The principal insect enemy is a minute beetle that breeds in the leaves and sometimes does injury by retarding the growth and rendering the wood unpeelable, as well as unhealthy. A red worm, about two inches long, eats its way up the center of some old and unhealthy sticks growing on partially decayed roots, but the injury from the insect is scarcely worth considering. White ants eat dead roots but seldom injure living wood, and they are to some extent enemies of all other insects which prey upon cinnamon trees. They build their nests around live branches, but this does not interfere with their growth. Crows and wood pigeons devour the berries with great eagerness, but in the process of digestion the productive qualities of the seed are not injured and by this means the seed is scattered over a large extent of country. Plants may be raised from the seed or by “laying.” The culture of the best kind, which is the true C. Zeylanicum, a cultivated Curanda or honey cinnamon (called penne rasse Kuroondu by the Sinhalese) is from the Kadirona, Ekla and Muradana gardens, between Colombo and Negunbo, which occupy a tract of country upwards of ten miles in length and in a winding circuit; as well as from the Maratuwa and Beruwala gardens, and those of Galle and Matara.
There is also a Cingalese bark found in the archipelago, which is very pungent and much resembles the true bark from Ceylon. It brings a fair price on the market, and is more aromatic than that of Ceylon. There are several kinds of it, some of it bringing an exorbitant price, and it is cultivated solely for royal use. The outer bark is never removed from it and for that reason it has the dark Java color. It, like the Saigon, is exported in 500-pound bundles.
No system was first regarded in planting cinnamon groves in Ceylon. This neglect greatly hindered cultivation. The usual way of establishing a garden is first to cut down all the brush and small trees on new ground, leaving the tall trees at intervals of from fifty to sixty feet, as a protection from the wind and from the strong hot rays of the sun. The fallen brush is next burned and the plat VESeared is lined out. The soil is turned up for hills in squares of about one to four feet at intervals of from six to ten feet, according to the richness of the soil. The longer intervals being provided with the richer soil. The ash from the burned brush mixed with the broken ground and vegetable matter, and from four to five of the berries are sown in each hill. Branches of trees are placed over the earth where the seed is planted to protect them from the sun and to keep the earth from parching.
Care should be taken in selecting the seed, as that from trees ten years old and up is best. Seed from old trees with coarse wood produces coarse and unpeelable bark, which helps to increase the chips. If the tree is to be raised from shoots, the youngest, or those not containing more than three leaves, must be selected, for if older they will surely die. The method of raising plants from layers is very good, because the numerous side branches which issue from the bottom of the trunk also furnish an abundant supply, well adapted for the purpose intended. The transplanting of the divisions of old roots or stumps is also much approved, as they yield shoots of useful size twelve months after planting. Great care must be taken in planting or removing the roots or the divisions of the parent stump, for should any of the rootlets become bruised, even to the tenth part of an inch in diameter, the injured part will certainly perish. Care must also be taken when removing the roots or stumps to keep as much earth on them as possible, or as can be carried with them. The dirt originally taken from the holes should not be returned, but there should be used, instead, that from the surface which has been burned and contains ashes mixed with vegetable manure. When old cinnamon trees are cut down and burned on their stumps, the roots will later produce a superior quality of cinnamon. Planting of seed is least advantageous as it requires greater attention than other modes, and the trees are longer reaching perfection. As they are planted four to five seeds in a hill, and as they are quite sure to germinate, the plants grow in clusters. Should no rain fall after planting on either the roots or stumps, they must be kept watered every morning and evening until the sprouts shoot out fresh buds. This will be in about two weeks from the planting and is an indication that they have taken root. In a month the shoots will be from three to four inches high. When seed is sown and dry weather follows, the seedlings will perish. It will be necessary, therefore, to plant the ground anew. It is wise, therefore, to raise plants in a nursery to supply the vacancies in the hills.
GALLE HARBOR
NEGOMBO CANAL
For a nursery, a plat of rich soil is selected, free from stone and cleared from brushwood, except the tall trees, which are left for shade. The ground is dug over and formed into beds from three to four feet wide and the seed is sown nine to twelve inches apart and shaded at eight to twelve inches above ground, by a pendall of leaves. The plants are kept watered on alternate days until they have one pair of leaves, but the shade should not be removed until the plants are six to eight inches high and are able to bear the sun. The seed will germinate in from two to three weeks. The planting takes place in autumn when the seed is gathered fully ripe. The seeds are heaped up in shady places, as the sun would crack and spoil them; the outer red coating will rot, turn black, and come off easily; the seed is then washed and dried in the air, but not in the sun; that which will float on water is rejected. The plants are taken from the nursery in October and November, and under favorable situations they will grow from five to six feet high in from six to seven years. A healthy bush will then afford two or three shoots ready for peeling, but should unfavorable results occur they will not yield for from eight to twelve years. After the plants are fully established in the field, very little cultivation is required, except to keep them free from the weeds. In a good soil from four to seven shoots may be cut every two years. Sometimes thriving plants may be cut first in four years and sometimes even in two years.
The quality of the bark depends upon its position on the branch; that from the middle is the best, that from the top second, and that from the base, which is the thicker part of the branch, the third grade. Shoots exposed during growth to the direct rays of the sun have their bark more acrid and spicy than the bark of those which grow in the shade. A marshy soil rarely produces good cinnamon, its texture being cross-grained and spongy, with little aroma. The quality is determined by the thinness of the bark—the thinner and more pliable the finer. The finest quality of bark is smooth and somewhat shiny and of a light yellow color. The shoot bends before it breaks, and when the fracture occurs it is generally in the form of a splinter which has an agreeable, warm, aromatic taste with a slight degree of sweetness.
Two crops are gathered each year—the first from April to August and the second from November to January. These particular seasons are selected for harvesting on account of their coming just after the heavy rains, just as the young, red leaf assumes the normal dark green. The sap then is more active and the bark is more easily detached. If there is not sufficient rain the garden may have to be cut over several times.
In harvesting, the shoots are not all cut at one time, but by degrees as they arrive at the required maturity. Those sticks which promise to peel at the next cutting are left. In pruning, with plenty of help, every stick older than two years is cut, whether it will peel or not.
A grayish, corky appearance is an indication of the fitness of the shoots for cutting. A certain amount is marked off for each day’s cutting, and it is an offense to go outside of that limit, but within the limit every one is allowed to go where he pleases. When fifteen or twenty persons are allowed to scramble as they please, the trees are agitated as by a whirlwind passing over them and in less than forty minutes the best sticks are cut and appropriated. Then systematic work begins. Every stick is then tested before cutting, and, if the wood is in a fair condition for peeling, it will take about two hours to finish a plat of 484 square feet. There are four such plats to an acre. They yield from twenty-eight to forty-eight pounds each. When called off, no one is allowed to cut another stick. (See [illustration].)
CUTTING CINNAMON
As long as the seed is on the bushes, which is nearly till the end of the year, the sticks carrying them do not peel, owing possibly to the growth being checked and with it the free flow of sap in the effort to mature the seed. If, therefore, this seed is allowed to remain great loss results, as by the time the seed-bearing bushes are peelable they will have grown so much as to yield coarse bark, fit only to quill coarse cinnamon, or not fit to be quilled at all. To avoid this loss the seed is stripped from the limb, when it will peel in its proper time. A plantation should not be expected to bring large returns for eight or nine years.
After the crop, which is taken from four to six inches above ground, has been cut, the stumps should be covered with fresh earth gathered from the space between the rows and formed into a heap around the base. Sometimes a fire is made on the old stump. The next year two or three times as large a crop may be gathered, and so on year after year, until at length the bushes will become so thick as to admit only the weeders and peelers. The only manure required is the weeds, which three or four times a year are placed between the rows and covered with earth. When the shoots are harvested from old stumps, they should be cut with one stroke of the heavy knife, in order to avoid splitting the stems. As the cutting takes place twice each year, there is a succession of young wood of different ages on the tree.
The branches are cut off from three to five feet long when tipped at the ends by means of a long knife in shape of a hook or sickle (catty). The shoots, after they have been cut and the tops have been removed, are tied into bundles and carried to the “wadi or peeling shed,” where they are allowed to sweat for the preparation of the bark. The leaves, side branches, and outer bark are next removed from the shoots. The peeler (Chaliyas, Sinhalese caste of cinnamon peelers), sits on the ground beside his bundle and with his left hand cuts the inner bark in two pieces (and sometimes three if very heavy and thick), longitudinal slits the entire length of the stick. It is then easily removed by means of a peeling knife (mama), which is round-pointed and has a projecting point on one side for ripping and running beneath the bark and lifting it about one-half inch on both sides. The bark will usually come off in halves eight to nine inches wide. The assortment is made at the same time. The coarse peelable bark is for coarse cinnamon, and that which is not peelable goes as chips. If the bark adheres firmly, the separation is facilitated by friction with the handle of the knife rubbed dextrously down it or with some smooth, hard piece of wood of convenient length.
When the day’s work is finished the assorted bark is piled in a small enclosure made by sticks driven in the ground and is covered with the day’s scrapings and with a mat. This treatment is called “fermenting,” but it is rather to hold the moisture and soften the bark for the next operation. After remaining twenty-four hours, or on the morning of the second day, three sticks are driven into the ground at such an angle that they will cross each other about one foot high. They are tied firmly at the point of crossing and are used for supporting the end of a fourth stick, the other end of which rests upon the ground. Before this support the native sits upon the ground and taking a strip of the bark places it on the stick and holds the upper end firm with his foot. Then with a small curved knife, having a slightly serrated edge, he scrapes off the cuticle, for if any remains it will create a bitterness. (See [illustration].) While it is yet moist with sap, it is placed with concave side downward to dry and it then contracts and curls into tubes or quills. The pipe maker, as he is called, is furnished with a board about one yard in length, a measuring stick, and a pair of scissors. He takes a bundle of the prepared sticks and sorts them into three or four grades, according to quality. Slips for the outer covering are then selected, the ends being cut square with the scissors. Placing this on the boards, he proceeds to pack within it as many of the smaller pieces (see [illustration]) as it will close over when dry, which is called piping. When the day’s work is finished the pipes are arranged on parallel lines stretched across the shed. They are then placed on hurdles covered with mats to dry in the sunshine until firm enough for handling. Afterwards, if necessary, the outer edges are pressed in and the ends are dressed and they are tied into bundles of about thirty pounds each. Three bundles are tied together to form a bale. This bale is covered with canvas. In this form the product is put on the market ready for export, where it appears in long brittle sticks of a pale yellow-brown color or white to lightish yellow ([Fig. 1]). The best grade is nearly as thin as paper, not being more than one-eighth to one-sixteenth of an inch in thickness. It has a very delicate flavor and is very superior in aroma and strength to the ordinary Chinese variety. It lacks the strength of Saigon, however, and is seldom called for except for medicinal use, for which in many cases it is highly valuable. A well-made cinnamon pipe, as it is called, will be of uniform thickness and quality; the edges will be neatly joined and in a straight line from end to end with the appearance of a tight roll of paper, which will feel firm under pressure of the thumb and finger, and the size of the pipes will vary according to the quality of the spice. In the finer sorts there are from fifteen to twenty-four pipes to the pound. In the next grade there are from ten to twelve. The coarser are stuck together without regard to appearance. In Ceylon the yield is about 150 pounds per acre, but on good soil and with careful tillage and manuring larger returns are obtained.
CUTTING AND QUILLING CINNAMON
Illustration: PEELING AND QUILLING CINNAMON
Following the Ceylon in value are the Saigon, Java, and Batavia and China. The Saigon ([Fig. 5]) comes from Cochin China, taking its name from the city of Saigon. (See [illustration].) The thinner-quilled Saigon bark, which is from selected twigs and smaller branches, is known as Java ([Fig. 4]). It has a very dark color and possesses an aroma and strength superior to these qualities in the Saigon.
The Java is sold chiefly in the whole state (the outer rind is never removed) and in a variety of packages known as piculs, containing 135 pounds each, mostly in cases, sometimes valued higher than Ceylon. The Tellicherry and Malabar are from Bombay and the province of Malabar. The Tellicherry is equal to the Ceylon in appearance, but the interior surface is more fibrous and the flavor is inferior and the bark thicker. It is superior to the Malabar, which is the true cinnamon introduced into India by the English. The Malabar contains nearly all the qualities of the Ceylon, but is paler in color with a feeble and less permanent odor. The sticks after piping are in length equal to those of the Ceylon, but the bark is shorter and the length of the stick is due to the method of telescoping the sticks of bark into one another. Batavia bark ([Fig. 2]) has a pale straw color and is a heavy bark superior to China Cassia Lignea ([Fig. 3]). It is exported in rolls of about fifty pounds each.
The bark of the larger or coarser shoots cannot be quilled and is removed in thick pieces. When mixed with the bark of the prunings and with those sticks which do not peel well it is known as chips. It brings a low price on the market and is used for grinding; and, although it does not have the delicate flavor of the quilled, what is lacking in delicacy is made up in pungency and, therefore, in many cases, it is preferred. Chips bring so low a price in the market that they may be purchased by the miller of spices and sold in the pure powdered state at a price much below what he can sell the bark at. This fact may account in a measure for prices given in the table in chapter II, [page 7], on adulteration.
The exporting of cinnamon chips is carried on by the planters to a great extent and at a great detriment to themselves. By doing this there is shortsightedness on their part, as the chips are bought by the miller at a low price in place of the high-priced bark, which necessarily must partly go begging for a market. Thus, the more valuable product so depreciates as to leave but little profit for the grower; his margin of profit is so small that he does not give his cinnamon grove proper attention and many times cuts it for wood. If the planter would distill his waste pruning and coarse chips for the oil which they contain he would be well paid for his labor.
BATAVIA
SAIGON
The cultivators of cinnamon give employment to a large number of people, several thousand being now engaged in the cultivation of the trees and the preparation of the bark. The pruning immediately follows the cutting and consists in cutting out all wood of more than two years’ growth and reducing all stumps left too high and removing all weak and crooked shoots and superfluous branches. This waste material, with the weeding, is buried near the outer roots, as it is found that organic matter is an excellent fertilizer for cinnamon, as the shoots reach out in all directions and permeate the decaying matter and so bring much benefit to the tree. It will not do to raise a mound around the base of the trunk, as the roots are thereby forced against their natural course and throw themselves into the mound. When this is once done they must be allowed to remain, as any disturbance would injure the tree. When the Ceylon cinnamon tree becomes too old to produce good growth it is cut down and the bark removed from the larger branches and the trunk, and is called mate cinnamon.
Although the finest bark is obtained from the cultivated trees there is much bark obtained from the uncultivated, of which C. multiflorum and C. ovalufolium are used for purposes of adulteration.
Cassia bark ([Fig. 3]), French cassia and German cassia, are the dried bark of a tree which grows twenty to forty feet high, sometimes even sixty feet high, irregular and knotty, with large spreading horizontal branches, outer bark thick, rough and scabrous, with ash color, speckled inner bark reddish with dark green and light orange color. It is known to commerce as cassia lignea or China cinnamon, and is from the Cinnamomum aromaticum. It is found in South China and is a native of Ceylon, Cochin China, East India, and Java, and has been brought from China since the earliest days of history. It is produced by an undescribed tree of several species of cinnamomum, differing from each other in foliage and in inflorescence and aromatic properties, and has about as many names in Chinese as there are provinces in which it is found growing. It is found most abundantly in the province of Kwangsi in the south of China, large quantities being brought to Canton annually from “Kwei lin Foo” (literally the City of the Forest of Cassia Trees), deriving its name from the forests of cassia around it, and is the capital and principal city of the province. The exact botanical source of China Cassia lignea was not known until 1884, although it was generally attributed to the tree now proved to yield it (Cinnamomum cassia). It is cultivated in the three following districts of China: Taiwu, Kwangsi province, and Lukpo and Loting, both in Kwang-tung province. Taiwu is about 180 miles west of Canton and from four to five miles from the West River, but the nearest cassia plantations are from twenty-five to thirty miles farther, in a southern or southwestern direction. The Loting district commences from eight to ten miles from Loting City. After leaving the West River about eighty miles of the Loting River and the Nam-Kong must be traversed before reaching the city, and from there the distance is made overland. In these plantations there are 52,600 acres which have been under cultivation for about forty years. Lukpo is least important. The city of Lukpo is situated on the northern bank of the West River. The nearest plantation is about fifteen miles distant from Lukpo City.
Cassia is also found in the following provinces: Hunan, Shensi, Hupeh, and Eonsu, and under the following Chinese names: Yuk-quai-she, Toro-Tsao, Chu-eh or Tsao, Chu-eh, Eh-Ming or Chueh Mings; for drugs—fungus, Huei-hua, Mu-erh. The Chinese have varieties which they cultivate under special circumstances, almost sacred, and by their long familiarity with different kinds and their expertness in determining its value they use it in many ways of which we are ignorant. The thick bark of the old uncultivated trees found growing near the Annam frontier is very highly valued by the Chinese on account of its supposed medicinal purposes, especially a dark bark called Ching Fa Kwei from the trees growing on the Ching Fa Mountains in Annam. The bark is stripped from the limbs as are the other grades of cinnamon. It is only about sixteen inches in length, has a dark-brown color and dull flavor, is not so sweet as true cinnamon and has a bitter taste. The bark is thick and heavy and not uniform in size. It is not enclosed or quilled and is brittle, with a less fibrous texture. It is less pungent and has a more mucilaginous or gelatinous quality. The outer, corky bark is of a deeper color and is the kind mixed with much coarser bark, known as “Cassia Vera,” which is ground by our spice grinders in place of the true cinnamon. This bark is imported in mats of from three to four pounds each, bound up in bamboo splints, and is shipped in bales of about eighty pounds.
Inferior cinnamon trees are found scattered over a large tract of country in the Indian Archipelago, C. Tamala Nees, and Eberm, extending into Silhet, Sikkin, Nepaul, Kumaon, and even into Australia. There are two species of Archipelago C., Cassia Blume and C. Burmanii Blume, the last being a Chinese variety found growing in Sumatra and Java, and the Philippines furnish “Cassia Vera.” Several other cassia Cingalese species of cinnamon cassia bark are found in their respective localities.
In the Khasia Mountains of East Bengal there is the bark of Abtusifolium Nees, and C. Pauciflorum Nees, and C. Tamala Nees, and Eberm found growing at 1,000 to 4,000 feet elevations, shipped from Calcutta. Cinnamomum iners reinw is a kind found in India, Ceylon, Java, and Sumatra, and other islands in a variable state and has a paler and thinner and different veined leaf than the true cinnamon. Young branches of the tree are collected and tied up in fagots constituting cassia twigs, which form a large article of commerce.
In order to powder cinnamon bark, it must first be passed through a cracker machine, as it is called, to reduce it to a proper size for feeding in a mill. The mill consists of a roller provided with very coarse teeth, which revolve through similar stationary teeth. The material is retained by a semi-circular, perforated plate, until it is reduced to the size of the perforation, or about the size of a coffee bean, when it is then ready for the burr stones.
True ground cinnamon (see [Figs. 22 and 23], Chap. III) consists of long cells of woody fiber which represent the thin layers found in the bark and scattered through it, consisting of a little starch in stellate cells. There is nothing more distinct between cinnamon and cassia than the amount of volatile oil the bark contains, and yet some of the inferior cinnamon bark does not contain as much volatile oil as does good cassia, but cinnamon oil is of a much higher and more delicate aroma. It is hard to detect cassia (see [Fig. 41], Chap. III; adulterated, [Fig. 46]) in ground cinnamon, as the flavor is so similar, but the cassia contains but little wood fiber and few stellate cells and the presence of starch is more marked. To test cinnamon, experts are required. The usual test is by chewing, but this method soon makes the mouth sore. The most inferior ground cassia, however, bears such a close resemblance to the best cassia and to the true cinnamon that it may be substituted for it or used as an adulterant without being easily detected. The following instructions are useful in examining powdered cinnamon.
Make a decoction of pure ground cinnamon, also a decoction of the suspected mixture, and filter both; when cold add to thirty grams of each one or two drops of iodine, when the decoction of pure cinnamon will be but slightly affected while the mixture will assume a blackish-blue coloration. Although much depends upon the age of the oils, the greater the age of the oil the smaller the quantity of iodine solution absorbed by it. The cheap sort of cassia, or “Cassia Vera,” can be distinguished from China cassia and from true cinnamon by its richness in mucilage, which can be extracted by cold water as a thick glary liquid, which on the addition of corrosive sublimate or neutral acetate of lead yields a dense viscous precipitate. The most reliable test for cassia in true cinnamon is to obtain the proportion of ash in each, the ash in cinnamon being 4.59 and 4.78 per cent., cassia lignea giving but 1.84 and “Cassia Vera” nearly the same as cinnamon, 4.08. Another test is to ascertain the amount of ash soluble in water. The quantities are 25.04, 28.98 per cent. in whole cinnamon, about 18 per cent. in chips, and 8.15 in “Cassia Vera,” and 26.40 in cassia lignea. Again the proportion of oxide of manganese is never more than 1 per cent. (0.13-0.97) in cinnamon, but it is over (1.13-1.53) in “Cassia Vera” and 3.65-5.11 in cassia lignea. The cinnamon ash will always be found white or nearly so, while both the cassia ashes are gray or brown and yield an abundance of chlorine on heating with hydrochloric acid. The cinnamon or cassia in the bark is easily distinguished, as the inferior kinds are thicker and appearance coarser and their color darker brown and duller and have a more pungent taste, which is less sweet than the true cinnamon, succeeded by a bitter taste.
The Ceylon bark is characterized by being cut obliquely at the bottom of the quill while other kinds are cut transversely. Ground cinnamon will deteriorate very rapidly. Cinnamon is so singularly sensitive in the bark that great care has to be taken in regard to its surroundings in shipping aboard vessels to prevent loss. Recourse has been made to various expedients, but it is found that the only effective safeguard is to pack bags of pepper between the bales. Ceylon alone exports 6,000 pounds of bark to this country annually in gunny bags of about 100 pounds each. Colombo (see [illustration]), which has one of the largest botanical gardens and the largest cinnamon grove in the world, is the principal city of export.
Cassia Buds (flores cassiæ immature clavelli cinnamomi) are the calyces of the immature flowers of the cassia tree which yields cassia lignea. The cassia buds of commerce bear a resemblance to cloves but are smaller and have the odor and flavor of cassia lignea or cinnamon. They are gathered in an unripe state at about one-fourth their normal size and are exported from Canton in piculs of 150 pounds each. Canton exported about 100,000 pounds in the first quarter of 1905, and Canton exports 19,000 piculs of cassia cinnamon of 133 pounds each and 500 piculs of twigs annually, and it is the principal city of export in the world for cassia barks. In Southern India the cassia buds are gathered from a variety of wild Cinnamomum iners reinw in a mature state, but they are inferior to the Chinese cassia buds. They have the appearance of nails with roundish heads of various sizes, and if completely dried the receptacle is nearly dark, firmly embracing the embryo seed, which protrudes.
Seeds which are used for seeding are obtained from trees ten years old and upward, which are not cut back but are allowed to grow naturally from fifty to sixty feet apart, while the balance of the orchard is cut down every six years for the bark. The seed trees are cut only in cases of necessity to supply a great demand for the thick bark on the trunks, when some can be sacrificed.
The Chinese frequently adulterate the oil of cassia with colophony, which may be easily detected, as it has a greater specific gravity. Extra pale colophony has a specific gravity of 1.070 and the pale colophony has a specific gravity of 1.110. Any oil heavier than 1.070 should be handled with suspicion. The darker the sample and the higher the specific gravity, the greater the adulteration. The tips of the branches and the other trimming which collects are carefully dried and distilled and sold as cinnamon oil.
Oil of cinnamon or cassia depends entirely upon the amount of cinnamyl aldehyde it contains. Oil of the true cinnamon bark (cinnamomum Zeylonicum) is the finest essential oil to be had. It is worth $5 per pound, while common cassia is worth only about seventy cents. True cinnamon oil is obtained in Ceylon and is of a golden color when fresh, with an aromatic odor, and is very pungent, being powerful enough to blister the tongue, but varies by age from cherry to yellow-red, the paler varieties being the most esteemed. Cinnamon leaf is redistilled in London to obtain the desired color, although at a loss of about 10 per cent. (formula C10H14), with a small quantity of benzoic acid. Fine cinnamon oil has a taste of intense sweetness, far sweeter than sugar, and a clove-like taste is at first developed. It is largely used in perfumery and medicine. Ceylon ships about 15,000 to 40,000 ounces annually. China exports as much. After a time it loses its sweetness and is no better than cassia oil. The tree yields essential oils from the leaves, bark, and root, each oil differing in composition and value, which accounts for the many different grades or prices for cinnamon oil found on the market. Cinnamon and cassia oils are of the same chemical compositions, their value being estimated by the amount of cinnamyl aldehyde they contain. That obtained from the roots is light, while that obtained from the leaves is so heavy as to sink in water.
There is but a small amount of oil in the bark, the yield being but 1 to 1.5 per cent.; six and one-half ounces of heavy oil and two and one-half ounces of light oil to eighty pounds of bark. It consists chiefly of cinnamyl aldehyde or the hydride of cinnamyl and a variable quantity of hydrocarbon. The oil derived from the coarser bark is a dark-brownish color. The oil distilled from the true bark is worth about eighteen times as much as the oil distilled from the leaves or leaf stalk or flower stalk. The latter oil is chiefly of eugenol, a hydrocarbon having an odor of cymene, a little benzoic acid and cinnamyl aldehyde. When mixed with the young twigs and cassia buds of cassia shrubs, this oil becomes a beautiful bright oil of excellent taste—characteristics which denote a higher percentage of aldehyde. Twigs show a familiar sweet cinnamon taste, but they yield a smaller percentage of essential oil than is distilled from the leaves, and has a specific gravity of 1.45 at 15 degrees C., showing 90 per cent. of aldehyde. The leaves yield sweet oil at 15 degrees C., specific gravity 1.056, aldehyde 93. Cassia buds yield essential oil 1.550 per cent., specific gravity 1.026, aldehyde 80.4 per cent. Stalk of cassia leaves, leaf stalk, and young twigs mixed yield essential oil 0.77 per cent., gravity 1.055, aldehyde 93 per cent.
The oil from the root contains cinnamyl aldehyde, hydrocarbon and ordinary camphor, and is lighter than water, both the oil of the bark and of the leaves being heavier. Oil from cinnamon bark and shoots is seldom exported. The oil is obtained in Ceylon by macerating the powdered bark or roots with a saturated solution of common salt for two days, after which the whole is distilled.
Cinnamyl aldehyde, which is a very pleasant smelling colorless liquid, may be separated from hydrocarbon, which is also found in the oil, by bringing the oil in contact with concentrated nitric acid. The crystals, which separate in long rhombic prisms or small plates, are decomposed by water into nitric acid. Free cinnamyl aldehyde may be prepared by allowing a mixture of ten parts benzolaldehyde, fifteen parts acetaldehyde, 900 parts of water, and ten parts of a 10 per cent. solution of caustic soda to stand eight or ten days, at a temperature of 30 degrees, the whole being frequently agitated. Finally the aldehyde is extracted by means of ether.
The pure Chinese cassia lignea bark, essential oil 1.5 per cent., has a specific gravity of about 1.035 to 1.060; aldehyde, 89.9 per cent., and at 15 C. should have a specific gravity of 1.050 to 1.070. On distilling, about 90 per cent. of pure cassia oil should pass over, and the balance, 10 per cent. residue, must not become solid in cooling, must not be brittle but must be in a semifluid state. If the oil contains less than 70 per cent. of cinnamyl aldehydes it may be considered adulterated, and at 75 per cent. should be handled with suspicion.
| 14 to 9 years old, | 79 per cent. Cinnamyl aldehyde |
| 15 years old, | 70 per cent. Cinnamyl aldehyde |
| 16 years old, | 73 per cent. Cinnamyl aldehyde |
Cinnamic acid occurs in the flowers of cinnamon and forms in small quantities by oxidation of the cinnamyl aldehyde when it comes in contact with the open air. It will dissolve in 3,500 parts of water at 17 degrees and is more readily soluble in boiling water and crystallizes from it in lustrous plates. From the cassia buds, refuse bark, young shoots and roots a fragrant volatile substance is obtained which floats on water, and when removed and allowed to cool, it becomes a suet, giving a delicious odor in burning, called a cinnamon suet, or wax, which is used largely by the Catholics and Buddhists in worship and at high native weddings. It was formerly used in Ceylon for making candles.
When true ground cinnamon and cassias are examined microscopically with polarized light, differences are revealed at once which are characteristic enough to distinguish the specimens, as shown in [Figs. 41 and 23], Chap. III. But of the proximate chemical composition of any of the barks but little is known. Numerous determinations and analyses of the ash have been made with a view to detecting peculiarities or the addition of mineral matter. The percentage of ash is extremely variable, depending on the age and quality of the bark. Saigon chips have been known to have 8.23 per cent., while unknown cassia bark has been found with but 1.75 per cent. Cinnamon bark will be likely to average less than cassia. Fiber-like ash is very variable, Saigon yielding 26.29 per cent., true cinnamon 33.08 per cent., while unknown cassia gives 14.20; that containing the least fiber contains the smallest amount of lime.
The albuminoids are also variable; the Batavia and Saigon barks appear to contain the most. The presence of over 4 per cent. is an indication of an inferior quality.
The amount of the tannin runs extremely small, any addition of which can be readily detected. One-fourth of the ash of cinnamon is soluble in water, but less of “Cassia Vera,” and less yet of cassia lignea. Little has been learned which would form a sound basis for distinguishing these barks. The presence of manganese cannot be considered as indicating that substance an essential element of the ash, nor is the fact one from which such definite conclusions could be drawn as to serve as the basis of legal testimony, but it is what gives to the different barks their different colors. True cinnamon contains less than 1 per cent. of oxide of manganese; “Cassia Vera” more than 1 per cent., and cassia lignea as high as 5 per cent.
The essential oil is but 0.5 to 1 per cent. of the bark of cinnamon and much less in inferior cassia.
We also find the presence of mucilage, coloring matter, resin, acid, starch, and lignea as well as volatile oil. Aside from the determination of volatile oil upon which the properties of cassia bark depends, chemical analysis seems to be of little value; the principal dependence must, with our present knowledge, be placed on the mechanical and microscopic examination.
To detect the adulteration of oil of cassia by oil of cloves, a drop of the oil should be heated on a watch glass. Genuine cassia evolves a fragrant vapor possessing but a little acridity. When, however, clove oil is present, the vapor is very acrid and excites coughing. With fuming nitric acid, cassia merely crystallizes; but if cloves be present it swells up, evolves a large quantity of red vapor and yields a thick reddish-brown oil. Pure cassia oil solidifies with concentrated potash but will not when mixed with clove oil.
A good test for cassia oil substituted for oil of cinnamon is to add nitric acid, specific gravity 1.36, to oil of cinnamon (one part of the latter to two parts of acid), and shake the mixture. A bright orange-colored liquid is first obtained, upon the surface of which floats an orange, resinous substance, slowly becoming deeper in color, until a beautiful cherry-red color is visible, by which time it has changed to a liquid that floats on a lighter-colored substratum, which also in a short time becomes nearly of the same tint. Bubbles then commence to appear and shortly afterwards spontaneous ebullition occurs, with the evolution of nitrous fumes and vapors of benzoic aldehyde. By the time this ebullition has ceased the amber-colored liquid commences to clear itself and finally a clear amber liquid is left with orange globules floating on its surface. Upon oil of cassia, nitric acid, specific gravity 1.36, has a different action, as, after mixing one part of oil of cassia with two of nitric acid, a dirty green supernatant resinous mass (slowly turning brown) is seen floating on a yellowish liquid, and no further change takes place. If a large excess of the acid be added after the first addition, the resinous mass changes to a deep reddish brown and the subnascent liquid takes a cherry-red color. The same reaction occurs if a large excess of nitric acid be added to oil of cassia at first, but in neither of these cases is there any spontaneous ebullition or evolution of the nitrous fumes and benzoic aldehyde vapors.
If oil of cassia be mixed with oil of cinnamon, the reaction with nitric acid takes place as with oil of cinnamon, but more tardily, according to the amount of cassia oil present; and, at the end of the process, a turbid subnascent liquid is seen, instead of a clear one, as is the case with pure oil of cinnamon. Spirits of nitrous ether can also be used to distinguish between these oils, as it forms a clear solution with that of cinnamon, but a turbid one with cassia.