The following interesting facts concerning the cultivation of the above
products in the island of Ceylon, were given in Mr. H. B. Brady's recent
address before the British Pharmaceutical Conference at Swansea:
The vanilla plant is trained on poles placed about twelve or eighteen
inches apart--one planter has a line of plants about three miles in
length. Like the cardamom, it yields fruit after three years, and then
continues producing its pods for an indefinite period.
The cinnamon (_Cinnamomum zeylanicum_) is, as its name indicates, a
native of Ceylon. It is cultivated on a light sandy soil about three
miles from the sea, on the southwest coast of the island, from Negumbo
to Matura. In its cultivated state it becomes really productive after
the sixth year, and continues from forty to sixty years. The
superintendent of the largest estate in this neighborhood stated that
there were not less than fifteen varieties of cinnamon, sufficiently
distinct in flavor to be easily recognized. The production of the best
so injures the plants that it does not pay to cut this at any price
under 4s. 6d. to 5s. per lb. The estate alluded to above yields from
30,000 to 40,000 lb. per annum; a uniform rate of 4½ d. per lb. of
finished bark is paid for the labor. Cinnamon oil is produced from this
bark by distillation; the mode is very primitive and wasteful. About 40
lb. of bark, previously macerated in water, form one charge for the
still, which is heated over a fire made of the spent bark of a previous
distillation. Each charge of bark yields about three ounces of oil, and
two charges are worked daily in each still.
The cultivation of the cocoanut tree and the production of the valuable
cocoanut oil are two important Cingalese occupations. These trees, it
appears, do not grow with any luxuriance at a distance from human
dwellings, a fact which may perhaps be accounted for by the benefit they
derive from the smoke inseparable from the fires in human habitations.
The cultivation of cocoanuts would seem to be decidedly profitable, as
some 4,000 nuts per year are yielded by each acre, the selling price
being £3 per thousand, while the cost of cultivation is about £2 per
acre. In extracting the oil, the white pulp is removed and dried,
roughly powdered, and pressed in similar machinery to the linseed oil
crushing mills of this country. The dried pulp yields about 63 per cent
by weight of limpid, colorless oil, which in our climate forms the white
mass so well known in pharmacy.
* * * * *