27TH JUNE 1895, No. 407, REVENUE.
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Jalap.—For many years the tubers of medicinal jalap have been cultivated on the
Ni gi r i s f or t he pur pose of suppl yi ng t he dr ug t o t he Medi cal St or es of Madr as. The dr ug has been much est eemed on account of t he hi gh per cent age i t yi el ds of t he r esi nous act i ve pr i nci pl e
called jalapin. Analysed in England in 1870, some of the first tubers cultivated at Ootaca-
mund gave as much as 18 per cent. of jalapin, and six years ago I examined a sample from a
large batch of tubers grown here, after it had been mixed and powdered at the Medical Stores
department, and it afforded the satisfactory yield of 16 per cent. of resin. On account of the
deterioration of jalap in its natural home, Mexico, the British Pharmacopœia of 1885 directed
that no tubers yielding less than 10 per cent. of resin should be used in official medicine.
Owing to the continued inferiority of the jalap supplied to the London and New York markets,
some authorities have suggested that the Pharmacopœia standard should be lowered. It is
therefore gratifying to know that the drug can be cultivated with ease on these hills, and that
of a superior kind. My attention was drawn last December to the sale in London of some East
Indian jalap which sold for the small sum of 2 d. per pound, when the ruling price for sound
tubers was 1 s. 5d. The broker's report was to the effect that the sample was " mouldy and pro-
bably worthless and apparently not containing any or a very infinitesimal quantity of jalapin
.” The above consignment had been sent to London by an experienced planter on the Nilgiris who
wrote to me for an explanation of the broker’s report, and at the same time sent me some tubers
similar to those forwarded to :Mincing Lane. I found that the tubers contained 12.2 per cent. of
resin and in other respects were of good quality, and I gave it as my opinion that the mouldy
condition of the drug was the sole cause of its depreciation in the market. The lower percentage
of resin detected in the above sample caused me, to examine several tubers grown in the Doda-
betta plantations. The result of the investigation was that the tubers grown in the original
plot, where crops had been taken for several years, showed a decided decrease in the amount of
resin. For instance, the last batch of drug supplied to Madras contained only 12.9 per cent.
of resin as against 16 per cent. six years ago. On the other hand some of the tubers cultivated
on fresh soil yielded 15.3 per cent. of resin, and one fine tuber, grown with a liberal supply of
manure, gave as much as 22 per cent. of resin—a phenuminal record in the history of jalap
cultivation in India.
Soap bark.—The Quillaia Saponaria, a South American tree yielding the soap bark of
commerce, was planted in the Botanic Gardens about eleven years ago and has since made very
satisfactory growth. Last year some of the trees were cut down and the bark was sent to me
for analysis and report. The bark had the characteristic appearance of the commercial article
and afforded the same amount of saponin when tested by Fluckiger's method. - When soaked
in water it produced a liquor having a permanent froth which showed that it could be used for
the same purposes as ordinary soap bark. Reference was made to Kew about the drug and the
authorities were asked if the export of such a bark to England would meet with satisfactory
r e mu n e r a t i o n . T h e y r e p l i e d t h a t t h e r e w a s a g o o d a n d i n c r e a s i n g d e ma n d f o r Q u i l l a i a b a r k i n
the London market, but the price was low, only ranging from £12 to £12-10 per ton.
Tea seed.—Last year several planters made enquiries about refuse tea seed and its value as
a manure, and asked if its oil could be extracted profitably and if the oil was in any way
superior to other well-known fixed oils. I made a complete analysis of some seeds from a
Nilgiri tea estate, and found in them 22.9 per cent. of fixed oil, 9.1 per cent. of saponin, 8.5 per
cent. of albuminoids, besides the ordinary constituents of plants. I concluded from the analysis
that the seed was not suitable for manufacturing an oil, as the proportion of oil was much smaller
than that found in such well-known products as sesame, cocoanut and castor, and the expressed
oil would always contain some of the bitter and acrid saponin which would render it very
objectionable. The seed might be used as a manure. The amount of nitrogen is not so high
as in many poonacs, but it is higher than the amount contained in farmyard manure and its
application would be beneficial to the tea bushes. The seed might also be used as an insecti-
cide, as saponin is a poison, and a strong decoction of the braised seeds might kill many of the
insects that infest cultivated tea bushes.
Green manure.—Several plants in India are used by the natives to enrich the soil in which
their crops are grown. In some places leaves and branches of forest trees are used, in other
places shrubs and herbs, and it is interesting to notice that leguminous plants are very often
selected—a class of plants that within the last few years have been shown to absorb nitrogen in
large quantities by means of the tubercles of their roots ; although, as far as my experiments go,
the amount of nitrogen found in leguminous plants is not at all excessive. Some specimens of
green manure are richer in nitrogen than others, and some contain mineral matter which is
very rich in potash or lime and phosphoric acid. An analysis has been made of the young
leafy branches of the yellow wattle ( Acucia dealbata ), one of the leguminous trees so abundant
on the Nilgiris, and on comparing its composition with that of cattle manure it was found to
contain more nitrogen and phosphoric acid and rather less potash and lime. One interesting
plant of the leguminous order has been sent me for analysis from Travancore where it is used
as a shade. This is the thornless variety of the coral tree ( Erythrina lithosperma ) introduced
from Java and known in this country as D a d a p .
T h e D a d a p l e a v e s c o n t a i n e d a s i m i l a r
proportion of nitrogen to that found in some other leguminous leaves and its ash was very rich
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