Spices and How to Know Them

by Walter M. Gibbs

About 1605, the Portuguese were driven from the Moluccas by the Dutch, who endeavored to control the clove trade by attempting to extirpate all the clove trees growing in their native islands, and to confine the culture of the entire production to the islands of Amboina and Ternate, paying the kings of the islands of Ternate, Tidor, and Batian a tribute to permit and assist in the extirpation of the trees.

In the years 1769 and 1771, the French, under M. Poivre, made two expeditions to the Moluccas and found the clove tree growing in some small islands which had been overlooked by the Dutch. From one of these (Guebi) they obtained plants and transplanted them to the Isle of France. In 1785, there were already between 10,000 and 11,000 clove trees growing in this island. At the end of the seventeenth century, an Arab carried the clove seed from Baurbou and planted the plantation in Zanzibar at Miltoni, on the road to Cheuni, and plants were conveyed from the Isle of France to Cayenne, Dominica, and to Mauritius. About 1770, the English put such a high duty on spices in Dominica that they ruined the trade there, and although M. Buee planted the clove tree there over 100 years ago, one tree is yet living.

Meanwhile the Dutch, who favored the one principal isle, Amboina, selecting that part of it called Leytimeer and the adjoining Uliasser Islands, divided Amboina into 4,000 allotments. Each of these divisions was expected to afford sufficient space for the growth of 125 trees, and it was ordered that this number should be cultivated.

In 1720, a law was passed rendering it compulsory on the natives to make up the full complement, and accordingly 500,000 clove trees flourished within the limit of the small island, their annual aggregate product amounting to more than 1,000,000 pounds of cloves. One can scarcely imagine the beauty of these immense groves with their pinkish-white, snowdrop blossoms, the sweet perfumes of which are carried by the gentle breezes far out to sea.

The clove tree, owing to its noble height, fine form, and luxuriant foliage, is attractive in appearance. Its bark is thin and smooth and its wood exceedingly hard, but it has a grayish color, which unfits it for cabinet work. It is an evergreen and in its natural state grows to a height of from thirty to forty feet, with a straight trunk, making it the most beautiful of all known trees. When four feet high, the tree spreads into several branches with fork stems, on which leaves grow directly opposite each other. The leaves are long, ovate and smooth, narrow and indented on the edge, pointed and of a thick consistency. The color of the upper surface inclines to red, as also does the stalk, while the under surface is green. The entire tree is strongly aromatic and the petioles of the leaves have nearly the same pungency as the calyces of the flowers.

In cultivating cloves, the mother cloves are best selected fresh, as they soon lose their vitality. The fruit seed (called by the natives paleny), which have become fertilized by remaining and ripening on the trees, are first soaked in water three days, or until they begin to germinate, and are next planted in a nursery of rich mold with bud end above ground in shaded beds, six inches apart if many plants are needed, twelve inches apart for few.

Two seeds are planted in each hill in the trenches, to provide for the failure of a part of the seed to germinate, and care must be taken not to plant the seed more than two inches below the surface. The nursery beds are made about six feet wide and of any length desired, and are shaded by a flat framework of sticks three to three and one-half feet high, over which is placed grass or cocoanut leaves. The ground is watered every morning and evening by taking water in the hand from the watering pot until the seeds have developed. When the plants appear above ground they are watered every other day, and when about six inches high every ten days.

The plants are kept in the shaded beds for nine months or one year, when they will be about one foot high. After this they are gradually left to the exposure of the sun by removing the framework for one or two months, when they are transplanted. Great care is taken in moving the plants. The transplanting takes place in the rainy season. The soil is first cut around the plant by a knife or triangular-shaped spade called “moaa,” “jembe,” or hoe, and the plant is lifted with as much soil adhering to it as possible and is placed across two banana strips of fiber, which are three to four inches wide and one to two feet long. The four ends of these strips are wrapped around the plants and firmly tied together, and in that way the plants are carried to the place for planting. Before planting, the pieces of fiber are cut beneath at each corner and the plant is placed in holes dug for them, which are about thirty feet apart; the earth is heaped around them and the balance of the fiber at the top is removed. The plant is watered every day if it is very dry weather, and at intervals for a year, or until it is about eighteen inches high.

A great many plants usually die out and continually replanting is necessary. For this reason, a nursery is kept for about five years.

After the clove garden is planted there is no need of shading, but as the trees have only a slight hold in the ground, they are easily destroyed. They should be planted in sheltered situations. For example, a hurricane which visited Zanzibar in 1872 destroyed nine-tenths of the clove groves, but the adjoining island of Pemba did not suffer nearly so much, especially on the west side of the island, which was fairly well protected. For this reason the clove trees are protected by belted double rows of casuarina and cerbera trees. Cocoanut trees are also planted at irregular places among the clove trees. The slaves, who have their own small orchards, often plant cassava, cocoanut, and mangoes with the clove not only for shelter but to secure extra crops from the other trees. In Amboina the young trees are planted in old clove orchards for shelter, and when the young trees grow up the old trees are cut down. A clayey substratum, dark yellow or volcanic earth, intermingled with gravel and dark loam, with a small amount of sand to reduce its tenacity, is the best soil. Marshy soil is fatal. Plants obtained from a garden of self-sown seeds are the best, but sometimes young branches are laid down and kept moist, when they will take root in about six months. Clove trees after being well rooted require but little care, and as the clove tree attracts much moisture, little other herbage will grow beneath it, but they must be kept well weeded or the trees will run into wild cloves. New leaves form in the wet season in May, the old leaves dropping off as new ones come, and soon after the leaves are out the germ of fruit is discovered and the tree begins to bear.