The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom / Considered in Their Various Uses to Man and in Their Relation to the Arts and Manufactures; Forming a Practical Treatise & Handbook of Reference for the Colonist, Manufacturer, Merchant, and Consumer, on the Cultivation, Preparation for Shipment, and Commercial Value, &c. of the Various Substances Obtained From Trees and Plants, Entering into the Husbandry of Tropical and Sub-tropical Regions, &c.

by P. L. Simmonds

The chief plants furnishing the drugs of commerce, and which enter largely into tropical agriculture, are the narcotic plants, especially tobacco, the poppy for opium, and the betel nut and leaf; as masticatories—but there are very many others to which the attention of the cultivator may profitably be directed. I have already trenched so largely upon my space, that I cannot do that justice to the plants coming under this section I could have wished. There are very many, however, of which I must make incidental mention. Some few medicinal plants have been already alluded to in former sections, particularly in that on dye-stuffs, &c.

THE COCA PLANT grows about four or five feet high, with pale bright green leaves, somewhat resembling in shape those of the orange tree. The leaves are picked from the trees three or four times a year, and carefully dried in the shade; they are then packed in small baskets. The greatest quantity is grown about 30 leagues from Cicacica, among the Yunnos on the frontiers of the Yunghos. Some is also cultivated near to Huacaibamba.

The natives in several parts of Peru chew these leaves as Europeans do tobacco, particularly in the mining districts, when at work in the mines or travelling; and such is the sustenance that they derive from them, that they frequently take no food for four or five days. I have often (observes Mr. Stevenson) been assured by them, that whilst they have a good supply of coca they feel neither hunger, thirst, nor fatigue, and that without impairing their health they can remain eight to ten days and nights without sleep. The leaves are almost insipid, but when a small quantity of lime is mixed with them, they have a very agreeable sweet taste. The natives generally carry with them a leather pouch containing coca, and a small calabash holding lime or the ashes of the molle to mix with them.

Cocculus indicus, or Indian berries.—This is the commercial name for the berries or fruit of the Menispermum Cocculus of Linnæus, M. heteroclitum of Roxburgh, Animerta paniculata of Colebrooke, A. Cocculus of Wright and Arnot, and Cocculus suberosus of Decandolle. It is a strong climbing shrub or tree, native of Malabar, Ceylon, and the Eastern Islands. The seeds or drupes contain a bitter poisonous acid, and are used for the purpose of stupefying fish, and, in the form of a black extract, for fraudulently increasing the intoxicating power of malt liquors; one pound of the berries, it is said, will go as far in brewing as a sack of malt. The berry is kidney-shaped, with a white kernel. Whilst the imports in 1846 were but 246 bags, in 1850 they had increased to 2,359 bags of about 1 cwt. each. The price is 19s. to 24s. the cwt.

A crystalline, poisonous, narcotic principle called picrotoxin, has been detected in these seeds, and occasionally employed externally in some cutaneous diseases. Cocculus crispus is used in intermittent fevers and liver complaints.

The annual imports now average 250 tons, and nearly the whole is consumed for illegal purposes by brewers. Though the practice is nominally discountenanced by the Legislature under the penalty of £200 upon the brewer and £500 upon the seller, yet under the recent tariff great encouragement is given to the introduction of these berries, the duty having been reduced from 7s. 6d. to 5s. the cwt.

The capsules and seeds of Xanthoxylum hostile are also employed for the same purpose as cocculus indicus. The bark of Walseria piscidia, a native of the Circar mountains, also intoxicates fish.

About 250 tons of Nux vomica, another species of dried flat seed possessing intoxicating properties, are also imported annually for the same purposes, and they fetch about 6s. to 8s. the cwt.

BETEL LEAF.—Piper Betel, a scandent species of the shrubby evergreen tribe of plants belonging to the pepper family, furnishes the celebrated betel leaf of the Southern Asiatics, in which they enclose a few slices of the areca nut and a little shell lime; this they chew to sweeten the breath, and to keep off the pangs of hunger, and it acts also as a narcotic.

Such is the immense consumption of this masticatory, termed Pan, in the East, that it forms nearly as extensive an article of commerce as that of tobacco in the West. The tax on the leaf forms a considerable portion of the local revenue of Pinang; in 1805, the tax yielded as much as 5,400 dollars.