The Indigenous Pepper of the Mysore Ghauts

摘要

In the heavy jungles of the Mysore Ghauts, where the annual rainfall averages three hundred inches, there are found four varieties of the indigenous pepper-piper nigrum-but only two are of any commercial value. The Canarese define the good kinds simply as "wollay dod menasoo" and "wollay san menasoo", literally "good big pepper" and "good small pepper." The other kinds are called "nai menasoo" ("dog pepper") indiscriminately, and may be here dismissed in a few words. The flowers and fruit outwardly closely resemble the good varieties, but the fruit is lacking in pungency, and to smell and taste both are disagreeable. The leaves and bark are totally dissimilar, the former being small and pointed and the latter in old vines deeply corrugated, compared with the large broad leaves and comparatively smooth bark of the valuable kinds.