AGAR-AGAR, a sort of edible seaweed, or tripe de roche, is found growing on the rocks about the eastern islands that are covered by the tide.  It is much used for making a kind of jelly, which is highly esteemed both by Europeans and natives for the delicacy of its flavor.  The first quality is worth about 30s. the picul (133 lbs.).  An inferior kind is collected on the submerged banks in the neighbourhood of Macassar (Celebes), by the Bajow Laut, or Sea Gipsies.  It is also collected on the rocks about the settlement of Singapore, for export to China, where it is much used as a size for stiffening silks and for making jellies.  It constitutes the bulk of the cargoes of the Chinese junks on their return voyage.  The quantity shipped from Singapore is about 10,000 piculs (12,500 tons) annually.

ICELAND MOSS (Cetraria islandica) combines valuable alimentary and medicinal properties.  It is imported in bags and barrels from Hamburg and Gothenburg, and is said to be the produce of Norway and Iceland.  The quantity consumed varies; in 1836, 20,599 lbs. paid duty; in 1840, 6,462 lbs.  In Carniola, swine, oxen, and horses, are fattened on it.  Boiled in water or milk, and flavored to the palate with sugar, wine, and aromatics, it forms a very agreeable diet for invalids.

CEYLON MOSS (Gracelaria, or Gigartina, lichenoides), a small and delicate fucus, is well known for the amylaceous property it possesses, and the large proportion of true starch it furnishes.  The fronds are filiform; the filaments much branched, and of a light purple color.  It grows abundantly in the large lake or back-water which extends between Putlam and Calpentyr, Ceylon.  It is collected by the natives principally during the south-west monsoon, when it becomes separated by the agitation of the water.  The moss is spread on mats and dried in the sun for two or three days.  It is then washed several times in fresh water, and again exposed to the sun, which bleaches it, after which it is collected in heaps for exportation.

Professor O’Shaughnessy has given the best analysis of this moss, which he described under the name of Fucus amylaceus; 100 grains weight yielded the following proportions:—­

  Vegetable jelly 54.50
  True starch 15.00
  Ligneous fibre 18.00
  Sulphate and muriate of soda 6.50
  Gum 4.00
  Sulphate and phosphate of lime 1.00
                                   -----
  Total 99.00
  With a trace of wax and iron.

I observe among the imports into New Orleans, 911 bushels of Spanish moss in 1849, and 1,394 bushels in 1848.  I do not know precisely its use, or from whence derived, but I believe it is chiefly used for stuffing cushions, mattresses, &c.