and to their operation may be traced a considerable amount of litigation and agrarian crime in the indigo districts of lower Bengal.  It is clear that when such balances become so large that the cultivator cannot discharge them, he is no longer a free agent, but is perfectly subservient to the will of his creditor, for whom he must cultivate whether he desire it or not.  Such burdens may even be handed down from father to son.  The fairness of the Agency system, and the justice with which the cultivators are treated, are best evidenced by the readiness with which they come forward to cultivate, and also by the comparative rarity of agrarian crime, arising out of matters connected with the poppy cultivation.

Opium is grown to some extent in Egypt; 39,875 lbs. were produced in 1831, and sold at two dollars a pound.

At the end of October, after the withdrawal of the Nile waters the seed, mixed with a portion of pulverised earth, is sown in a strong soil, in furrows; after fifteen days the plant springs up, and in two months has the thickness of a Turkish pipe, and a height of four feet; the stalk is covered with long, oval leaves, and the fruit, which is greenish, resembles a small orange.  Every morning before sunrise, in its progress to maturity, small incisions are made in the sides of the fruit, from which a white liquor distils almost immediately, which is collected in a vessel; it soon becomes black and thickish, and is rolled into balls, which are covered with the washed leaves of the plant; in this state it is sold.  The seeds are crushed for lamp oil, and the plant is used for fuel.

A plant known in Jamaica under the name of bull hoof yields a narcotic which has been administered successfully in the shape of tincture and a syrup, instead of opium.  This is the Muracuja ocellata, or Passiflora muracuja, of Swartz, an elegant climber, bearing bright scarlet blossoms.  There is another species, M. orbiculata, found in Hayti and other islands, which may be expected to partake more or less of the properties of the former.  The flowers are the parts most commonly employed.

THE TOBACCO PLANT.

Several species of Nicotium furnish tobacco; that chiefly used in Europe is procured from N.  Tabacum and its numerous varieties, a plant naturally inhabiting the hotter parts of North and South America.  The popular narcotic furnished by tobacco is probably in more extensive use than any other, and its only rivals are opium and the betel-nut and leaf of the East.  The herb for smoking was brought to England from Tobago, in the West Indies, or from Tobasco, in Mexico (whence the name), by Sir Ralph Lane, in 1586.  Seeds were shortly after introduced from the same quarter.

“Tobacco, as used by man,” says Du Tour, “gives pleasure to the savage and the philosopher, to the inhabitant of the burning desert and the frozen zone; in short, its use, either in powder, to chew, or to smoke, is universal; and for no other reason than a sort of convulsive motion (sneezing) produced by the first, and a degree of intoxication by the two last modes of use.”