The imports and home consumption of arrowroot have increased very largely, as may be seen from the following figures:—
| Imports | Retained for home consumption | |
| lbs. | lbs. | |
| 1826 | 318,830 | 358,007 |
| 1830 | 449,723 | 516,587 |
| 1834 | 837,811 | 735,190 |
| 1835 | 287,966 | 895,406 |
| 1838 | 404,738 | 434,574 |
| 1839 | 303,489 | 224,792 |
| 1840 | 408,469 | 330,490 |
| 1841 | — | 454,893 |
| 1842 | 890,736 | 846,832 |
| 1846 | 905,072 | 981,120 |
| 1847 | 1,185,968 | 1,211,168 |
| 1848 | 906,304 | 933,744 |
| 1849 | 1,036,185 | 1,032,992 |
| 1850 | 1,789,774 | 1,414,669 |
| 1851 | 2,083,681 | 1,848,778 |
| 1852 | 2,139,390 | 2,024,316 |
SALEP is the prepared and dried roots of several orchideous plants, and is sometimes sold in the state of powder. Indigenous salep is procured, according to Dr. Perceval from Orchis mascula, O. latifolia, O. morio, and other native plants of this order. On the continent it is obtained from O. papilionaceo, and militaris. Oriental salep is procured from other orchideœ. Professor Royle states that the salep of Kashmir is obtained from a species of Eulophia, probably E. virens. Salep is also obtained from the tuberous roots of Tacca pinnatifida, and other species of the same genus, which are principally natives of the East Indies and the South Sea Islands.
The large fleshy tubers of tacca, when scraped and frequently washed, yield a nutritious fecula resembling arrowroot.
Salep consists chiefly of bassorin, some soluble gum, and a little starch. It forms an article of diet fitted for convalescents when boiled with water or milk. The price of salep is about eight guineas per cwt. in the London market. A little is exported from Constantinople, as I noticed a shipment of 66 casks in 1842; excellent specimens from this quarter were shown in the Egyptian department of the Great Exhibition in 1851. It was formerly a great deal used, but has latterly been much superseded by other articles.
Major D. Williams ("Journal of the Agri. and Hort. Soc. of India," vol. iv., part I), states that the tacca plant abounds in certain parts of the province of Arracan, where the Mugs prepare the farina for export to the China market.
After removing the peel, the root is grated on a fish-skin, and the pulp having been strained through a coarse cloth, is washed three or four times in water, and then dried in the sun.
According to a recent examination of the plant by Mr. Nuttall ("American Journal of Pharmacy," vol. ix., p. 305), the Otaheite salep is obtained from a new species of tacca, which he names T. oceanica.
For many years we have obtained from Tahiti, and other islands of the South Seas, this fecula, known by the name of Tahiti arrowroot, probably the produce of Tacca pinnatifida. It is generally spherical, but also often ovoid, elliptic, or rounded, with a prolongation in the form of a neck, suddenly terminated by a plane.