Lamengan eject only masses of liquefied rock and scoriæ, cemented by the heat, but the regular lava currents have never been observed."
While Dr. Hochstetter was occupied with this excursion to the active crater of Gedeh, the remaining members of the Expedition had reached Tjipodas at the foot of this fire-mountain, where, at an elevation of 4400 feet above sea-level, and at an annual average temperature of 63°.5 Fahr., the first attempts were made to acclimatize in Java the valuable quinquina tree (Cinchona sp.).
Although for twenty years past the introduction into Java of the cultivation of the quinquina tree, the bark of which is of such superlative importance for suffering humanity, had been repeatedly tried, this praiseworthy intention was only successfully carried into effect in 1852, through the purchase of a specimen of Cinchona Calisaya from the Jardin des Plantes at Paris by the then colonial minister of the kingdom of the Netherlands, M. Pahud, afterwards Governor-general of the Dutch East Indies. M. Pahud had the plant brought to Leyden with the utmost care, whence it was conveyed to Rotterdam for shipment to Batavia. Immediately on its arrival this plant, the progenitor of all that have been grown since, was placed in what is called the Governor-general's strawberry garden in Tjipodas, where it was protected by a bamboo shed from rain and sun, and at the time of our visit was 16 feet high. Dr. Hasskarl, widely renowned as a botanist, was, on the recommendation of Dr. Junghuhn, who had himself
been urgently requested to undertake the duty, entrusted with a mission to Peru, whence he was to bring back offshoots, and germinating seeds, of the various species of Cinchona from which quinine is obtainable. Two years later, a Dutch man-of-war was specially despatched to Callao, the harbour of Lima, to convey Hasskarl with his valuable booty. That gentleman accordingly brought away with him four well-rooted young trees, and the seeds of four species of Cinchona,[50] but only the saplings gave promise of success, whereas the greater part of the seeds, on being sown, were lost. M. Hasskarl has had the reproach cast upon him, that during his expensive residence of two years' duration in Peru, he should have collected such few data of the higher and lower limits of vegetation of the China plant, and the conditions of soil and mountain temperature under which it best flourishes, of the general influence exercised on it by storm and humidity, as also upon the annual quantity of rain it requires, whether a shady or sunny place of growth be best adapted to it, the period of flowering and fructification, the alterations which may be rendered necessary by its habits of growth at various points, as to what are its natural enemies, and how far its alkaloid properties are affected by the greater or less elevation above the sea of the spot in which it is growing, &c., &c. Nay, some persons went so far as to allege that the botanist had never seen one single
China plantation, and had never personally selected either the plants or the seed, but had made arrangements for being supplied with the specimens he brought by means of the native bark-collectors (Cascarilleros). As though still further to enhance the public discontent with Hasskarl, and the failure of his expensive mission, fate unhappily willed that his wife, who was said to be bringing with her his papers and memoranda of his stay in Peru, was lost, together with the vessel which, after several years' separation from her husband, was about restoring her to his arms, in consequence of which many questions relating to the cultivation of the China plant in northern and southern Peru remained unanswered! Hasskarl ere long returned to Europe "for his health," and the superintendence of the China cultivation was in June, 1858, committed to Dr. Junghuhn, in whose careful charge it now is, and has taken a start which leaves no room to doubt its ultimate and permanent success.
In October, 1856, there were in Tjipodas 105 China trees of 2 feet 6 inches high (41 of C. Calisaya, 64 of C. Condanimea). On 31st October, 1857, there were only 95 about 4 feet 11 1⁄2 inches in height, all in flourishing condition, while 10 had died. The cause of this lamentable phenomenon could not long escape the piercing glance of Junghuhn. The first tender shoots had been planted in a Tufa soil, the fertile covering of which barely exceeded 6 to 9 inches in thickness, and were surrounded by roots and stumps of immense forest trees that had been cut down, which of course prevented
anything like expansion, and, in a word, completely stifled their growth.
In the case of the earlier plants, there was far too little attention paid to the requisite amount of shade. The timber had been entirely cleared away, and the young plants were consequently exposed during the whole day to the fierce heat of the tropics. Unless people were prepared to see the whole plantation go to ruin it was necessary at once to take protecting measures against it. Junghuhn was a man fit for any emergency, as he had already shown on the banks of his native Rhine, when the very cells of Ehrenbreitstein, with which a chivalric adventure had made him acquainted in his youth, had for once been found too narrow to hold him. So in Tjipodas, the man of resources was able at once to devise a remedy. With incredible toil, and the most fostering care and attention, nearly all the trees were, without detriment to one single twig, transplanted from a soil so little congenial to them to the adjoining Rasamala-wood, in which the proud, slight Liquid-ambar Altingiana imparts its own peculiar character to the primeval forest, where they were transferred to spots partly shaded, which had already been prepared for their special reception, the sites having been surrounded with trenches to carry off the superfluous water. In October, 1857, some of the trees had already attained a height of 14 1⁄2 feet; by 31st March of the following year they were already 15 1⁄2 feet, while their stems were 3.44 inches thick. Many of the trees planted near the forest had within
three months grown from 9 to 21 inches, while the few that remained on their old site had only gained 9 or 10 inches in height, a fact which seemed incontestably to prove that the new site was the better adapted to them. In June, 1857, the first blossom had made its appearance on one of the Condanimea, but it was not till May, 1858, that the majority of the trees were in full bloom, or that the ripening fruit began to make its appearance. When all the fruits ripen, Dr. Junghuhn told us he was in hopes he would secure 80,000 fruit, which, as each fruit contains about 40 seeds, would provide him with 3,200,000 seedlings. It is not indeed a question merely of ripe and at the same time fertilized seeds, but chiefly whether the bark of this plant contains in the land of its adoption, and under different conditions, that costly alkaloid quinine, which seems daily to become more indispensable in the science of medicine.
Despite the most anxious solicitude there had long been remarked in Tjipodas a gradual decay of some of the shoots, but it was only a few days before our arrival that after a most minute zealous inquiry the cause of this phenomenon was discovered. A minute insect, scarcely 1⁄25 of an inch in length, of the Bostrichus species, proved to be the foe of these plants. The holes which are burrowed by this insect, are drilled quite through the wood of the stem and branches into the very pith, in which it finally stops and lays its eggs. The Cinchona trees thus bored through are irremediably ruined, but there is always the hope that, as the roots remain