r of excellence is that grown in Uhiao: it
is exported in leaf or in the form called _kambari_,
roll-tobacco, a circle of coils each about an inch in
diameter. The people of Khutu and Usagara mould the pounded
and wetted material into discs like cheeses, 8 or 9 inches
across by 2 or 3 in depth, and weighing about 3 lbs.; they
supply the Wagogo with tobacco, taking in exchange for it
salt. The leaf in Unyamwezi generally is soft and
perishable, that of Usukuma being the worst; it is sold in
blunt cones, so shaped by the mortars in which they are
pounded. At Karaguah, according to the Arabs, the tobacco, a
superior variety, tastes like musk in the water-pipe. The
produce of Ujiji is better than that of Unyamwezi; it is
sold in leaf, and is called by the Arabs _hamumi_, after a
well-known growth in Hazramaut. It is impossible to give an
average price to tobacco in East Africa; it varies from 1
khete of coral beads per 6 oz. to 2 lbs."

Some of the most beautiful and fragrant tobacco fields in the world
are to be found in Syria. Indeed it may truthfully be said that a
field of Latakia tobacco is hardly inferior in beauty to the large and
fragrant orchards of the olive and mulberry, or the wheat fields on
the terraced sides of Mount Lebanon.

The tobacco plant is cultivated in various parts of Syria and
particularly by the Druses on "The Lebanon," as it is usually called.

[Illustration: Tobacco field in Syria.]

The cultivation of tobacco in Syria, has been a considerable industry,
and the product has acquired a reputation in European markets that has
demonstrated its real value, and a constant demand for this variety of
the plant. Latakia tobacco resembles in flavor the yellow tobacco of
Eastern Thibet and Western China, both of them grown from the same
seed. Latakia tobacco is not sweated like most tobacco, but is first
cured in the sun and then hung up in the peasants' huts to cure until
ready for market. The plants ripen very fast and emit an aromatic
odor, increasing in strength as the plants ripen. For smoking it has
but few superiors. After curing, it is baled and sent to Europe, where
it is manufactured into smoking tobacco. The plants are well
cultivated and watched against the ravages of birds, which seem to
like the young and tender plants especially before they are
transplanted. From the nature of the soil the plants are watered