There is, however, no danger of the actual extirpation of the trees unless the plan is adopted of leaving them standing, and stripped of their bark, as in the Loxa forests. Poeppig says that, in these cases, the trees in the tropical forests are attacked by rot with extraordinary rapidity; hosts of insects penetrate the stem to complete the work of destruction, and the healthy root becomes infected. Thus the valuable species called C. Uritusinga has really been almost exterminated.
But where the trees are felled it is only necessary to observe the precaution of hewing the stem as near as possible to the root, in order to be sure of its after-growth.[90] Under these circumstances, after six years the young trees are ready to be felled again in the milder regions, and after twenty years in cold and exposed localities. From the base of the stems, when not barked, a number of shoots spring out between bark and wood; and Dr. Karsten says that, though an interval of rest of twelve or fifteen years must be given to the forests where the chinchona-trees have thus been felled, this only promotes further investigation in the endless untrodden forests, while, in the mean time, the younger generation is growing up in those which have already been exhausted.[91]
The danger, therefore, is not in the actual annihilation of the chinchona-trees in South America, but lest, with the increasing demand, there should be long intervals of time during which the supply would cease, owing to the forests being exhausted, and requiring periods of rest. In many districts this is already the case. The bark which comes from Loxa is in the minutest quills, and in the forests of Caravaya, after an interval of rest of several years, the root-shoots had scarcely grown to a sufficient size to yield anything but quill bark. Then again the supplies of bark from South America are not nearly sufficient to meet the demand, and the price is kept so high as to place this inestimable remedy beyond the means of millions of natives of fever-visited regions. For these reasons the incalculable importance of introducing the chinchona-plant into other countries adapted for its growth, and thus escaping from entire dependence on the South American forests, has long occupied the attention of scientific men in Europe.
In 1839 Dr. Royle, in his 'Illustrations of Himalayan Botany,'[92] recommended the introduction of the chinchona-plants into India, pointing out the Neilgherry and Silhet hills as suitable sites for the experiment, and Lord William Bentinck took some interest in the project. M. Fée had previously recommended the introduction of these plants into the French colonies;[93] and in 1849 both Dr. Weddell[94] and M. Delondre[95] strongly urged the adoption of this measure. The former declared that posterity would bless those who should carry this idea into execution.[96]
The Dutch, who possess in the island of Java a range of forest-covered mountains admirably adapted for chinchona cultivation, were, however, the first to take active steps for its introduction into the Eastern Hemisphere; and their praiseworthy exertions deserve, what they lay claim to with justice, the approbation of the whole civilized world. The experiment in Java, however, has only been tried with a very limited number of valuable species of chinchonæ, and has met with very limited success, owing to the introduction of worthless kinds, and to mistakes in the cultivation, committed during the first few years.
For the last thirty years Dutch scientific men, among whom the name of the botanist Blume may be mentioned, had urged their Government to undertake the introduction of chinchona-plants into Java. But it was not until the year 1852 that M. Pahud, the Dutch Minister of the Colonies, was authorized to employ an agent to collect plants and seeds of valuable species in Peru, and to convey them to Java. He selected, for this important mission, M. Justus Charles Hasskarl, a botanist who had for some time superintended the gardens in Java, but who was a stranger to South America—ignorant of the country, the people, and the languages—unacquainted with the forests where the chinchona-trees are found, and who had never seen them growing in their natural state. He sailed for Peru in December, 1852, with orders not to confine himself to the Calisaya plant, but to collect plants and seeds of as many different species as possible. His original orders were to proceed from Guayaquil to the chinchona-forests of Loxa in the first instance; but he changed his plan, and, landing at Lima, crossed the cordilleras in May, 1853.
It would be difficult, in making a chance journey from the coast to the forests of the Eastern Andes, to hit upon a part where valuable species of chinchona-trees are not known to exist. There are such spaces—forest tracts—intervening between the more favoured regions, where only species of little value are found, such as C. pubescens, C. scrobiculata, &c.; and on one of these, between the region of grey barks in Huanuco and that of C. Calisaya in Caravaya, M. Hasskarl, through being unacquainted with the localities, was so unfortunate as to stumble. He crossed the Andes by the road from Lima to Tarma, and descended the eastern slopes into the montañas of Vitoc, Uchubamba, and Monobamba; returning thence by Xauxa into the loftier region of the Andes. Near Uchubamba he saw trees which he believed to be C. Calisaya; but that species is never found to the north of the province of Caravaya. He however collected a quantity of seeds of this imaginary C. Calisaya, and four packets of a species which he called C. ovata, with smaller quantities of C. pubescens and C. amygdalifolia.
The species called by M. Hasskarl C. ovata now forms the bulk of the chinchona-plantations in Java. He found it on dry sunny hills, without much shelter from the sun, in a very sandy micaceous soil, at an elevation of 5500 to 6000 feet above the sea. It is sometimes a mere shrub, but occasionally rises to fifteen or twenty-five feet, with elegant pink flowers and reddish fruit. The native name is cascarilla crespilla chica; and as the crespilla grande is the C. ovata of Weddell, it is probable that M. Hasskarl was thus led into the mistake of calling his new species C. ovata. The leaves are smooth above, with a felt-like pubescence on the under surface, and the hairy capsules are probably an indication of the worthlessness of the species.[97] In fact, no good kinds are found in this part of the country, and all the seeds sent home by M. Hasskarl were equally valueless. He collected specimens of C. lanceolata of Pavon, at a place called "Escalera de San Rafael," on the road between Uchubamba and Xauxa.[98]
From Xauxa M. Hasskarl went to Cuzco, and thence in September to Sandia in the province of Caravaya; but finding that the seeds of chinchona-trees are ripe in August, and that he had arrived too late, he returned to Lima, and finally took up his abode at Arequipa until the following year. In March, 1854, he again set out, crossed the Andes to Puno, and, after wandering over part of Bolivia, at length reached the little village of Sina in Caravaya, near the frontier between Peru and Bolivia, in April. He had assumed the feigned name of José Carlos Müller, and had printed it on his cards, one of which he presented to the governor of Sina, Don Juan de la Cruz Gironda, requesting him to procure a supply of chinchona-plants for him. Gironda refused, but introduced the stranger to a Bolivian named Clemente Henriquez, a clever and intelligent, but dishonest and unscrupulous man. Henriquez agreed to procure 400 plants of C. Calisaya for a certain sum, part of which was to be paid down, and the remainder on delivery of the plants. M. Hasskarl then went on to the village of Sandia, where he took up his abode, without entering the chinchona forests, and waited there until the plants should arrive. Meanwhile Henriquez employed an Indian to collect the stipulated number of plants, round a place called Ychu-corpa,[99] on the frontier of Bolivia; and when they were brought to him he went to Sandia, delivered them to M. Hasskarl, and received his money. An outcry was afterwards raised against Henriquez, by the people inhabiting villages bordering on the chinchona forests, who considered that their interests would be injured by the exportation of the plants: they declared they would cut his feet off if they caught him, and he has ever since been obliged to live at Pelechuco, in Bolivia.[100] This feeling has rendered any future operations of a like nature exceedingly difficult.
M. Hasskarl left Sandia with these plants in June, 1854, but they were not placed in Wardian cases at the port of Islay until August, and on the 27th of that month he finally left the coast of Peru in a sailing vessel, and shaped his course direct for Java.[101] He arrived at Batavia with twenty Wardian cases on December 13th, but all his plants have since died except two.[102] On his arrival M. Hasskarl was intrusted with the cultivation of chinchona-plants in Java, with the rank of Assistant-Resident, and was made a Knight of the Netherlands Lion, and Commander of the Order of the Oaken Crown.[103]