1.Arracacha.—

The Indian Government are desirous of introducing this esculent vegetable into India. Arracacha. Esculenta is cultivated in the cooler mountainous districts of South America, where the roots form the staple diet of the inhabitants. Steps have been taken at Kew (where plants are now growing) to procure the seed, and as success in cultivation appears to depend on the method of treatment, I place on record here some particulars obligingly communicated to me by Mr. Henry Birchall, of Bogotà.

About 6,000 feet is nearly the upper level of any extensive cultivation of this plant, though it produces at points a good deal higher. It is rather difficult to obtain the seed, as from habit the peons invariably pull up the flowering plants, as they do not produce the edible root. I have several times missed getting the seed by the stupidity of the men who weeded the plantations.

As regards cultivating from seed, my own experience is nil; but my neighbours assure me that by repeated replanting of the young plants at last the roots are developed.

When this is attained the plant throws out a multitude of shoots from the crown. These being broken off are prepared by slicing the base neatly and then putting them in a hole dibbled about 5 or 6 inches deep, and require no further care than ordinary weeding, for which the rows and plants should be 3 feet apart.

"In our climate the root conies to perfection in eight to ten months, and the weight of a good specimen will be 8 to 10 lbs. No doubt if scientifically cultivated, and in properly loosened soil, much larger roots would be obtained. We do not even plough, but stick the seed in immediately after burning off the forest or the brushwood, as the ease may be. It is cheaper to take new ground page 32 then to cultivate properly the old, as we have no command of skilled labour or good apparatus."

2. Chestnut-flour.—

We are indebted to Mr. D. E. Colnaghi, H.B.M.'s Consul at Florence, for specimens of the dried chestnuts, flours, and necci (the cakes made from them), which are so important an article of subsistence in the Apennines. The collection of the specimens for Kew was due to the kindness of Dr. L. Bacci, of Castigliano, in the mountains of Pistoja.

The fresh chestnuts are dried, or rather roasted, for three days and nights in a seccatoio, or drying room, on a latticed floor covering a chamber in which a fire is lighted. The husk is then easily removable, and the kernel is ready to be ground into flour, which is of a pinkish colour. This is mixed to the consistence of cream with water, and poured on fresh chestnut leaves to be baked into small circular cakes, necci, between heated stones.

The cakes were found to contain only 6.7 per cent, of proteids, with 3.4 per cent, of flour. The large amount of dextrin is due to the high temperature to which the chestnuts are subjected in the process of drying. Professor Church thinks that chestnut-flour ought to be of easy digestibility, and a suitable children's food, considering that it contains over 40 per cent, of nutritious matters soluble in pure water.

3. Thé de Montagne.—

The Museum of the Royal Gardens is indebted to Mr. George Maw for a specimen of a product used, according to the Rev. Wentworth Webster, who procured it, as tea in the Basses Pyrenées in France, and on the Spanish side of the Pyrenees in Navarre. It was found to consist of the dried shoots of a species of Lithospermum, which was identified with probability as L. officinale.