The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom Part 61

From the ports and districts of Siam 3,500 to 4,000 tons are exported annually.

The duty at present levied on pepper in England is 6d. per lb., while the wholesale price for that of Pinang, Malabar, and Sumatra is about 4d. per lb. White pepper ranges from 9d. to 1s. 6d. per lb. The prime cost in Singapore is not more than 1d. per lb.

About 70,000 or 80,000 piculs of pepper are annually exported from Singapore, of which between 30,000 and 40,000 piculs have, until within the last two years, gone on to Great Britain. More than one-half of the pepper exported from Singapore is grown in the island by Chinese settlers.

The low selling price of the article in the English market, the high duty levied upon it, and the large freight paid for its carriage to Great Britain, now leave so small a price to the cultivator in Singapore, that the cultivation ceases to be remunerative, and is carried on at a loss; and has consequently within the last year or two begun to decrease rapidly, involving the Chinese growers, who are generally of the poorest cla.s.s, and without capital, in great distress. A reduction in the duty on pepper has always been followed by a very large increase in the consumption of the article, as will appear from the following table, showing the importation and consumption in Great Britain during some of the first and last years of the different rates of duty:--

Duty Singapore price Year Quant.i.ty consumed s. d. s. d. s. d.

1811 1,457,383 1 10 0 7 to 0 7 1814 941,569 1 10 0 11 " 1 1 1820 1,404,021 2 6 0 6 " 0 6 1824 1,447,030 2 6 0 4 " 0 5 1826 2,529,027 2 0 0 4 " 0 4 1836 2,749,491 1 0 0 0 " 0 0 1837 2,625,075 0 6 0 0 " 0 0 1845 3,210,415 0 6 0 2 " 0 4

In a memorial from the mercantile community of Singapore, sent home in 1848, it is a.s.serted that a reduction in the duty of pepper being always attended by a large increase in the consumption, would not lead to any serious loss in the revenue, while it would confer a great boon on the poorer cla.s.ses, to whom it has now become a necessary article of life. The reduction would also be of great advantage to British manufacturers, as well as to our Indian possessions, by giving rise to an increased demand or British goods and productions, and of the highest benefit to the agricultural settlers in the island of Singapore, by enabling them to procure for their labor an honest means of livelihood.

The pepper vines, which are allowed to climb poles or small trees, are tolerably productive at Singapore; and pepper planting is esteemed by the Chinese to be a profitable speculation, particularly if they are enabled to evade the payment of quit-rent. An acre of pepper vines will yield 1,161 lbs. of clean pepper. In Sumatra a full grown plant has been known to produce seven pounds; in Pinang the yield is much more. The average produce of one thousand vines is said, however, to be only about 450 lbs.

Colonel Low, in his "Dissertation on Pinang," published at Singapore some years ago, gives an interesting account of the culture:--

"Pepper was, during many years, the staple product of Pinang soil, the average annual quant.i.ty having been nearly four millions of pounds; but previous to the year 1810, the above amount had decreased to about two-and-a-half millions of pounds, which was the result of the continental system.

The price having fallen at length to three and three-and-a-half dollars the picul--with only a few occasional exceptions of rises--the cultivation of this spice was gradually abandoned, and the total product at this day does not exceed 2,000 piculs. The original cost, when pepper was at a high price, together with charges of transporting it to Europe, amounted to 36,357 for every five hundred tons, and the loss by wastage was estimated at 5,405.

In 1818 there remained on the island 1,480,265 pepper vines in bearing, and the average value of exports of pepper from Pinang, including that received from other places, was averaged at 106,870 Spanish dollars.

As might have been foreseen, the fall of prices has so greatly diminished the cultivation of pepper to the eastward, that a reaction is likely to take place; and has in fact partly shown itself already. Some Chinese in Pinang and Province Wellesley seem to be preparing to renew the cultivation. There is abundant scope for the purpose on both sides of the harbour, and every facility is at hand for carrying it on.

The pepper plant or vine requires a good soil, the richer the better, but the _red_ soil of the higher hills is not congenial, the Chinese think, to it. The undulations skirting the bases of the hills, and the deep alluvial lands, where not saturated with water, or liable to be overflowed, are preferred.

The Chinese have always been the chief cultivators, and when the speculation flourished they received advances from the merchants, which they paid back in produce at fixed rates.

When pepper was extensively cultivated on Prince of Wales Island, the European owner of the land had the forest cleared by contract, and the vines planted by contract, and when the vines came into bearing the plantation was farmed to the Chinese from year to year, on payment of a specific quant.i.ty of pepper. Any other plan would have ruined the capitalist, as the culture is almost entirely in their hands in the Straits' Settlements, and they will not work so well for others as when they are specially interested.

The plants are set out at intervals, _every way_, of from seven to twelve feet, according to the degree of fertility of the soil, so that there are from 800 to 1,000 vines in one orlong of land; to each vine is allotted a prop of from ten to thirteen feet high, cut from the th.o.r.n.y tree called _dadap_, or where that is scarce, from the less durable _boonglai_; these props take root, thus affording both shade and support to the plant. The plant may be raised from seed pepper, but the plan is not approved of, cuttings being preferable, as they soonest come into bearing. The pits in which these cuttings are set should be a foot-and-a-half square, and two feet in depth; manure is not often applied, and then it is only some turf ashes. However unpicturesque a pepper plantation may be, still its neat and uniform appearance renders the landscape lively, and there can be little doubt that the island has suffered in its salubrity since the jungle usurped the extensive tracts formerly under pepper cultivation.

When the vine has reached the height of three or four feet, it is bent down and laid in the earth, and about five of the strongest shoots which now spring up are retained and carefully trained up the prop, to which they are tied by means of ligatures of some creeping plants.

One Chinese, after the plantation has been formed, can take care of two orlongs of land. The usual mode is this:--an advance is made by the capitalist to the laborer for building a house, and for agricultural implements; he then receives two dollars monthly to subsist on, until the end of the third year, when the estate or plantation is equally divided betwixt the contracting parties.

The Chinese and even European cultivators used formerly to engage the Chinese who had just arrived from China; they paid off their pa.s.sage-money, and then allowed them two dollars monthly, for provisions, for one year; with a suit of clothes, by which means the cost of the labor of one man averaged about three dollars monthly; but this plan is attended with risks.

The cost attendant on the cultivation of two orlongs of land, with pepper, for three years--the Chinese laborer receiving the usual hire of _five_ Spanish dollars monthly--will be nearly as follows:--

Spanish dollars.

Price of land, clearing, and planting 40 Quit rent, at 75 cents per annum per orlong 9 Two thousand plants 4 " dadap props 6 Implements 6 House 10 Labor 200 Interest, loosely calculated at 30 --- Total Spanish dollars 305

In a very good soil a pepper vine will yield about one-eighth of a pound of dry produce at the end of the first year; at the end of the second, about a quarter of a pound; and at the expiration of the third, probably one pound; at the end of the fourth, from three to three-and-a-half pounds; ditto fifth, from eight to ten pounds.

After the fifth year up to the fifteenth, or even the twentieth year, about ten pounds of dry merchantable produce may be obtained from each vine, under favorable circ.u.mstances. The Chinese speculator used to rent out his half-share of a new plantation for five years, to his cultivating partner, after the expiration of the first three years, at the rate of thirty piculs per annum; the total produce of these five years giving about fifty-six piculs annually as an average.

A pepper plantation never survives the thirtieth year, unless in extremely rich soil, and then it is unproductive; nor will the young vine thrive on an old worn out pepper land, a peculiarity which is applicable to the coffee tree. The chief crop lasts from August to February. Four pounds of dry produce, for ten of green, is considered a fair estimate. Great care is requisite in the management of the vine, and especially in training and tying it on the props. It is subject to be injured by the attacks of a small insect. The green pepper dries in two or three days, and if it is intended that it shall be black, it is pulled before it is quite ripe. To make white pepper, the berry is allowed to remain somewhat longer on the vine; it is, when plucked, immersed in boiling water, by means of which process and subsequent friction, before drying, the husk is separated.

The exports of pepper from Pinang in the last four years have been--In 1849, 2,591,233 lbs.; in 1850, 6,397,733 lbs.; in 1851, 2,366,933 lbs.; in 1852, 2,112,133 lbs."

A small quant.i.ty of pepper seems to be annually exported from Ceylon, which I presume is the growth of that island; thus there were:--

54 cwts. shipped in 1842 83 " " 1843 102 " " 1844

In the Customs' returns of Ceylon, it is cla.s.sed with cardamoms, and 160 to 170 cwt. of the two were shipped in each of the years 1850 and 1851. Last year the quant.i.ty was smaller.

Pepper cultivation has been introduced into the Mauritius, and in 1839 more than 500,000 lbs. were imported from thence, but as the shipments have since decreased, I presume it has given place to the more profitable staple sugar. I have been able to glean no information as to the progress it has made in the West Indies. In Cayenne it has been successfully carried on for many years; and large shipments of pepper have been made thence to France.

BLACK PEPPER EXPORTED FROM SINGAPORE.

Piculs. Value in rupees.

1841 Total Exports 66,810 " Growth of Singapore 21,231 47,674 1842 Exports 74,228 " Growth of Singapore 32,277 72,473 1843 Exports 57,883 " Growth of Singapore 35,585 79,900 1844 Exports 67,148 " Growth of Singapore 42,995 386,152 1845 Exports 65,892 " Growth of Singapore 39,019 350,443 1846 Exports 56,709 " Growth of Singapore 35,712 ----- 1847 Exports 60,994 " Growth of Singapore 36,565 328,397

Pliny, the naturalist, states that the price of pepper in the market of Rome in his time was, in English money, 9s. 4d. a pound, and thus we have the price of pepper at least 1,774 years ago. The pepper alluded to must have been the produce of Malabar, the nearest part of India to Europe that produced the article, and its prime cost could not have exceeded the present one, or about 2d. a pound. It would most probably have come to Europe by crossing the Indian and Arabian ocean, with the easterly monsoon, sailing up the Red Sea, crossing the desert, dropping down the Nile, and making its way along the Mediterranean by two-thirds of its whole length. This voyage, which in our times can be performed in a month, most probably then took eighteen. Transit and customs duties must have been paid over and over again, and there must have been plenty of extortion. All this will explain how pepper could not be sold in the Roman market under fifty-six times its prime cost. Immediately previous to the discovery of the route to India by the Cape of Good Hope, we find that the price of pepper in the markets of Europe had fallen to 6s a pound, or 3s.

4d. less than in the time of Pliny. What probably contributed to this fall, was the superior skill in navigation of the now converted Arabs, and the extension of their commerce to the islands of the Eastern Archipelago, which abounded in pepper. After the great discovery of Vasco de Gama, the price of pepper fell to about 1s. 3d. a pound, a fall of 8s. 1d. from that of the time of Pliny, and of 4s. 9d. from that of the Mahommedan Arabs, Turks, and Venetians.

In 1826, 14,000,000 lbs. of pepper were imported into the United Kingdom, of which about 5,500,000 were re-exported. In 1841, 15,000,000 lbs. were imported, of which 6,500,000 were re-shipped to other countries.

The home consumption, it will be seen, now averages about 3,250,000 lbs.:--

Imports Home consumption lbs. lbs.

1845 9,852,984 3,209,718 1846 5,906,586 3,299,955 1847 4,669,930 2,966,022 1848 8,125,545 3,185,337 1849 4,796,042 3,257,911 1850 8,028,319 3,170,883 1851 3,996,496 3,303,403 1852 6,641,699 3,524,501

The following return shows the number of bags of pepper imported into the United Kingdom, with the quant.i.ty retained for home consumption:--

Imports. Retained for home consumption.

Black. White. Black. White.

bags bags bags. bags.

1843 37,840 3,861 21,163 2,257 1844 60,705 2,123 23,525 2,122 1845 80,600 3,208 30,294 2,861 1847 37,194 1,236 28,768 2,654 1848 65,518 3,042 31,665 3,950 1849 43,651 2,616 32,246 3,859

CHILLIES AND CAYENNE PEPPER.

Chillies or capsic.u.m are long roundish taper pods, divided into two or three cells, full of small whitish seeds. When this fruit is fresh, it has a penetrating acrid smell; to the taste it is extremely pungent, and produces a most painful burning in the mouth. They are occasionally imported dry, and form the basis of Cayenne pepper; put in vinegar when green or ripe, they are an acceptable present in Europe. In Bengal the natives make an extract from the chillies, which is about the consistence and color of treacle.

The consumption of chillies in India is immense, as both rich and poor daily use them, and it is the princ.i.p.al ingredient in all chutnies and curries; ground into a paste, between two stones, with a little mustard, oil, ginger, and salt, it forms the only seasoning which the millions of poor in that country can obtain to eat with their insipid rice. They are worth in the Bombay market about 40s. the candy of 600 lbs.

Immense quant.i.ties of the capsic.u.m are used by the native population of the West Indies, Africa, and Mexico; the consumption as a condiment being almost universal, and perhaps equal in quant.i.ty to salt. Ten barrels of these peppers were shipped from Montego Bay, Jamaica, in the first six months of 1851.

The wholesale price of chillies in the London market is from 15s. to 25s. the cwt., and there is a duty of 6d. per pound on them. Cayenne fetches 9d. to 2s. the pound.

Chilli is the Mexican name for all varieties of _Capsic.u.m_. They are natives of the East and West Indies, and other hot climates. _C.

annuum_ is the species commonly noticed, but there seems to be numerous varieties, which by many are reckoned species. Thus, _C.

frutescens_ is a shrubby plant, which, along with _C. minimum_, supplies the variety called bird-pepper, it grows to a larger and more bushy size; _C. baccatum_ has a globular fruit, and furnishes cherry or berry capsic.u.m. They are all of the simplest culture, and may even be grown with very little care in England. Culture appears to increase the size, but to diminish the pungency of the fruit. In capsic.u.ms irritant properties prevail so as to obscure the narcotic action.

Their acridity is owing to an oleaginous substance called capsicin.

Cayenne pepper is used in medicine chiefly in the form of tincture, as a rubefacient and stimulant, especially in cases of ulcerated sore throat. It acts on the stomach as an aromatic condiment, and when preserved in acetic acid it forms chilli vinegar.

Red pepper may be considered one of the most useful vegetables in hygiene. As a stimulant and auxiliary in digestion it has been considered invaluable, especially in warm countries. A kind called the tobacco red pepper, is said to possess the most pungent properties of any of the species. It yields a small red pod, less than an inch in length, and longitudinal in shape, which is so exceedingly hot that a small quant.i.ty of it is sufficient to season a large dish of any food.

Owing to its oleaginous character, it has been found impossible to preserve it by drying, but by pouring strong boiling vinegar on it a sauce or decoction can be made, which possesses in a concentrated form all the essential qualities of the vegetable. A single drop of this sauce will flavor a whole plate of soup or other food.