WOOD.

For carpenters’ purposes the wood is in much esteem, being easy to work, light, durable, and not liable to be injured by insects, particularly by the kumbang, a species of the bee, whose destructive perforations have been already mentioned; but is also said to be more affected than most others by the changes of the atmosphere.  The leaf is small, of a roundish oval, the fibres running straight and parallel to each other, and terminates in a remarkably long and slender point.  The flower has not yet been brought to England.  The fruit is described by C.F.  Gaertner (De Seminibus Volume 3 page 49 tab. 186) by the name of Dryobalanops aromatica, from specimens in the collection of Sir Joseph Banks; but he has unaccountably mistaken it for the cinnamon tree, and spoken of it as a native of Ceylon.  It is also described, from the same specimens, by M. Correa de Serra (Annales du Museum d’Histoire Naturelle Tome 10 page 159 plate 8) by the name of Pterigium teres; without any reference whatever to the nature of the tree as yielding this valuable drug.  A beautiful engraving of its very peculiar foliage has been made under the direction of Mr. A.B.  Lambert.

CAMPHOR FOUND IN THE FISSURES.

The camphor is found in the concrete state in which we see it, in natural fissures or crevices of the wood, but does not exhibit any exterior appearance by which its existence can be previously ascertained, and the persons whose employment it is to collect it usually cut down a number of trees, almost at random, before they find one that contains a sufficient quantity to repay their labour, although always assisted in their research by a professional conjurer, whose skill must be chiefly employed in concealing or accounting for his own mistakes.  It is said that not a tenth part of the number felled is productive either of camphor or of camphor-oil (meniak kapur), although the latter is less rare; and that parties of men are sometimes engaged for two or three months together in the forests, with very precarious success.  This scarcity tends to enhance the price.  The tree when cut down is divided transversely into several blocks, and these again are split with wedges into small pieces, from the interstices of which the camphor, if any there be, is extracted.  That which comes away readily in large flakes, almost transparent, is esteemed the prime sort or head; the smaller, clean pieces are considered as belly, and the minute particles, chiefly scraped from the wood, and often mixed with it, are called foot; according to the customary terms adopted in the assortment of drugs.  The mode of separating it from these and other impurities is by steeping and washing it in water, and sometimes with the aid of soap.  It is then passed through sieves or screens of different apertures in order to make the assortment, so far as that depends upon the size of the grains; but much of the selection is also made by hand, and particular care is taken to distinguish from the more genuine kinds that which is produced by an artificial concretion of the essential oil.