annual harvest is the fittest time for pruning the trees. After the eradication of the lallang, the growth of innoxious grasses is to be encouraged in the intervals between the trees, which will give the plantation the appearance of a park, and the plough is now to be abandoned.

The nutmeg tree is monœcious as well as diœcious, but no means of discovering the sexes before the period of inflorescence are yet known. The relative proportion of male and female trees to each other is also undefined, and is indeed the result of chance. Setting aside however all pretension to mathematical precision, the number of productive trees may be roundly estimated at two-thirds of the whole cultivation. As the monoecious plants are productive, the number of male trees necessary to be retained will depend entirely on that of the monoecious kind; all above this number, being considered superfluous, should be cut down and other trees planted in their stead. Were I indeed to originate a nutmeg plantation now, I should either attempt to procure grafts on male stocks on such trees as produce the largest and best fruit, by the process of inarching, notwithstanding the speculative hypothesis of the graft partaking of the gradual and progressive decay of the parent tree, leaving a branch or two of the stock for the purpose of establishing a regular polygamy, by which means the plantation would consist of monœcious trees only; or I should place the young plants in the nursery at the distance of four feet from each other, and force them to an early discovery of their sex, by lifting them out of their beds once a year and replacing them in the same spot, so as to check the growth of wood and viviparous branches. The sex might thus be ascertained on an average within the fourth year, and the trees removed to the plantation and systematically arranged, whereas in the usual mode of proceeding it is not ascertainable in general before the seventh year.

Upon an average, the nutmeg tree fruits at the age of seven years, and increases in produce till the fifteenth year, when it is at its greatest productiveness. It is said to continue prolific for seventy or eighty years in the Moluccas, but our experience carries us no farther than twenty-two and a half years, all the trees of which age that have been properly managed, are still in the highest degree of vigor and fecundity; and for this reason no term for planting a succession of trees can as yet be fixed upon. Seven months in general elapse between the appearance of the blossom and ripening of the fruit, and the produce of one bearing tree with another under good cultivation may, in the fifteenth year of the plantation, be calculated at five pounds of nutmegs, and a pound and a quarter of mace. I have observed, however, that some trees produce every year a great quantity of fruit, whilst others constantly give very little. It bears all the year round, but more plentifully in some months than in others. The SECOND SERIES, Vol. XII, No. 36.—Nov., 1851.

42

great harvest may generally be looked for in the months of September, October, November and December, and a small one in April, May and June. Like other fruit trees on this portion of Sumatra, I have remarked that it yields most abundantly every other year. The fruit having ripened, the outer integument bursts spontaneously, and is gathered by means of a hook attached to at long stick, and the mace being cautiously stripped off and flattened by the hands in single layers, is placed on mats for three or four days in the sun to dry. Some planters cut off the heels and dry the mace in double blades, from an opinion that the insect is apt to breed in or about the heels, and that the double blade gives a better and more substantial appearance to the mace. The former idea is entirely groundless, for if the article be properly cured, kept in tight packages in a dry situation, and exposed to the sun for five or six hours once a fortnight, there need be no apprehension of the insect; and if it is not, it will assuredly be attacked by it whether the heels be cut off or not; again, the insect is much more likely to nestle within the fold of the double blade, and the fancied superiority of appearance has so little weight with the purchaser, as not to counterbalance the risk of probable deterioration and eventual loss. In damp and rainy weather the mace should be dried by the heat of a charcoal fire, carefully conducted so as not to smoke it or blacken its surface.

The nuts liberated from their macy envelope are transported to the drying house, and deposited on the elevated stage of split neebongs, placed at a sufficient distance from each other to admit of the heat from a smouldering fire beneath without suffering even the smallest nuts to pass through. The heat should not exceed 140° of Fahrenheit, for a sudden inordinate degree of heat dries up the kernels of the nuts too rapidly, and its continued application produces fissures in them, or a fermentation is excited in them which increases their volume so greatly as to fill up the whole cavity of the shell, and to prevent them from rattling when put to this criterion of due preparation. The fire is lighted in the night. The smoking house is a brick building of a suitable size, with a terraced roof, and the stage is placed at an elevation of ten feet from the ground, having three divisions in it for the produce of different months. The nuts must be turned every second or third day that they may all partake equally of the heat, and such as have undergone the smoking process for the period of two complete mouths and rattle freely in the shell, are to be cracked with wooden mallets, the worm-eaten and shriveled ones thrown out, and the good ones rubbed over simply with recently prepared well sifted dry lime. They are now to be regarbled, and finally packed for transportation in tight casks, the insides of which have been smoked, cleaned, and covered with a coating of fresh water If packed in chests, the seams must be dammered to

and lime.

prevent the admission of air or water. There is no necessity for sorting them, as previously to their sale they are classed into sizes in the Company's warehouses in London.

The mode generally practised in preparing nutmegs for the market, is to dip them in a mixture of salt water and lime, and to spread them out on mats for four or five days in the shade to dry. I am, however, convinced from much experience that this is a pernicious practice, not only from the quantity of moisture imbibed in this process encouraging the breeding of insects and rendering the nuts liable to early decay, but from the heating quality of the mixture producing fissures and occasioning a great loss in the out turn; whereas by liming them simply in the dry way as I have recommended, the loss ought not to exceed 8 per cent. In May, 1816, I made some experiments on this subject. I cracked a quantity of nutmegs that had been smoke dried for two months, and distributed them into four equal portions. I prepared the nuts of one parcel with a mixture of lime and salt water; those of the second were rubbed over merely with fine well dried shell lime such as the natives use with their betel, although I have no doubt but that recently prepared and well sifted common lime would answer equally well; those of the third parcel were mixed, unlimed, with one-third of their weight of whole black pepper; and those of the fourth, also unlimed, with the same proportion of cloves. They were then put into separate boxes with sliding tops, and numbered 1, 2, 3 and 4, in the order I have mentioned them. At the expiration of the first year they were all sound. After that of the second, I found three worm eaten nuts in No. 1, and two in No. 3, but those in Nos. 2 and 4 remained untouched. The injured nuts were allowed to remain, and after the lapse of the third year, five worm eaten ones were discovered in No. 1, three in No. 3, and two in No. 4, those in No. 2 being in their original state. Four years and four months have now elapsed since the commencement of these experiments, and upon examining the several parcels the other day, the number of decayed nuts has not increased in Nos. 1, 3 and 4, and those in No. 2 are as good as the day they were put into the box. These experiments not only prove the superiority of liming in the dry way, but also the fact that the progress to general decay in a heap of nutmegs, even after the insect has established itself, must be a work of years. In the shell they will keep for a great length of time. I have myself kept them in this state for six years, and when cracked they were found perfectly sound. From the report of the London brokers, however, they will not answer in Europe on account of the heavy allowance for shells, which is one-third of the weight; but the Chinese merchants are in the daily habit of exporting them to Pinang and China, where they are in request. It is stated on the best authority, that unlimed or brown

nutmegs, as the home dealers call them, mixed with cloves as in experiment No. 4, are highly esteemed in England, and even preferred by some to the limed produce; most probably from the greater facility of detecting the flaws in them in their naked

state.

Although the clove tree attains great perfection in the red mould of these districts, it is more partial to a less tenacious soil. Its cultivation has been established for many years in the West Indies and at Bourbon, and is of secondary importance only. The mother cloves are planted in rich mould at the distance of twelve inches from each other, screened from the sun and duly watered. They germinate within five weeks, and when four feet high are to be transplanted at intervals of thirty feet, with a small admixture of sand with the red mould so as to reduce its tenacity; and to be cultivated in the same mode as the nutmegs, only that when full grown they require less manure in the proportion of one-third. They yield generally at the age of six years, and at that of twelve are in their highest state of bearing, when the average produce may be estimated at six or seven pounds of marketable fruit each tree during the harvest, which takes place in the rainy months, but with us they have hitherto borne two crops in three years only. The fruit is terminal, and when of a reddish hue is plucked by hand, so that the process of gathering it is tedious. It is then dried for several days on mats in the sun, until it breaks easily between the fingers, and assumes a dark brown color. It loses about 60 per cent. in drying. When past its prime the clove tree has a ragged and uncombed appear ance, and I am led to suppose that its existence is limited to twenty years, unless in very superior soil, in which it may drag out a protracted and unprofitable state of being to the period of perhaps twenty-four years. Hence it becomes necessary to plant a succession of seedlings when the old trees have attained eight and this octennial succession must be steadily kept age, years of in view.

With reference to the number of laborers, cattle and ploughs necessary for a plantation of 1000 nutmeg and clove trees, after the ground has been thoroughly cleared of underwood and stumps of trees, I consider that seven Chinese or active Bengalee laborers, fifty head of cattle and two ploughs, would be sufficient for all the purposes of the cultivation, with the exception of collecting the clove harvest, which, being a very tedious process, would require an extra number of hands; and indeed the best plan would be to gather it in by contract.

ART. XXXIII.-On Coral Reefs and Islands; by JAMES D. DANA.-Part Fourth.

From the Report on Geology of the Exploring Expedition under Capt. Wilkes, U.S.N. FORMATION OF REEFS, AND CAUSES OF THEIR FEATURES AND GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION.

An inquiry into the causes and origin of the features presented by coral reefs and islands, has led us to glance at the nature of coral zoophytes, and at the effects of various agents upon their development. The way has thus been prepared for considering the bearing of these facts, and of other influencing causes, on the growth of the coral plantation as a whole. While, therefore, the preceding pages treat of zoophytes as individual species, the following will relate to those results which proceed from their accumulation, and the causes which have determined the features and geographical distribution of reefs and islands.

1. Formation of Reefs.

Very erroneous ideas prevail, respecting the appearance of a bed or area of growing corals. The submerged reef is often thought of as an extended mass of coral, alive uniformly over its upper surface, and, by this living growth, gradually enlarging upward and such preconceived views, when ascertained to be erroneous by observation, have sometimes led to skepticism with regard to the zoophytic origin of the reef-rock. Nothing is wider from the truth: and this must have been inferred from the descriptions already given. Another glance at the coral plantation should be taken by the reader, before proceeding with the explanations which follow.

Coral plantation and coral field, are more appropriate appellations than coral garden, and convey a juster impression of the surface of a growing reef. Like a spot of wild land, covered in some parts with varied shrubbery, in other parts bearing only occasional tufts of vegetation over barren plains of sand, here a clump of saplings, and there a carpet of variously colored flowers -such is the coral plantation. Numerous kinds of zoophytes grow scattered over the surface, like vegetation upon the land: there are large areas that bear nothing, and others that are thickly overgrown. There is, however, no green sward to the landscape; sand and fragments fill up the bare intervals between the flowering tufts or where the zoophytes are crowded, there are deep holes among the stony stems and folia.

These observations will prepare the mind for some disappointment in a first view of coral reefs. Nature does not make greenhouses, but distributes widely her beauties, and leaves it for man