Show LICORICE HARVEST IN SYRIA gathered in gacic and carried on to the laboard for export in a ceries of articles describing the planting cultivation preparation for market and transplantation of licorice root appearing in the pharmaceutical era there is the following interesting descriptive bit in digging licorice root in syria the usual way is to start a trench the length of the place to be dug over about two feet in length and work from that each man placing in a pile the root he has dug and at the end of the day or longer time it is taken to the scales weighed and paid for at a specified rate per pound an allowance is always made for the dirt that clings to the roots the root is alien spread out for few days to slightly dry and piled in stacks about three feet wide and four or five feet high rounded off at the top in order to shed rain and the piles are narrow enough to prevent heating at the end of the rainy season the root is spread out to dry for about two months being turned over from time to time during which process all the adhering earth dries and falls off leaving it clean and ready for transport to the point of shipment it is then put into canvas sacks each containing from two hundred to two hundred and fifty pounds two sacks a load for a camel or a mule for the transportation of the root from the place where dug to the port of shipment varying from two to five days journey a contract is usually made with some arab or bedouin sheik for a certain amount of cantara of about five hundred pounds each at a certain price ho to furnish camels and men and the owner to furnish and fill the sacks about fifty camels go in one caravan or drove for which five men are sufficient sometimes if one hundred camels are used the caravan goes in sections one man riding a donkey leads the first camel and the rest follow the leader while the other men walk keeping any camel from straying or lagging too far behind thy usually start early in the morning and go ten or fifteen miles when a halt is made the loads are taken off and tho camels are allowed to browse on the thorn or other bushes for three or four hours then loaded again and about the same distance traveled when they are again unloaded and alie night is spent in the open air and an early start made the next morning and so on until the seaboard is reached where they are unloaded the root is weighed the sacks emptied and returned to be again refilled in the fields for another trip on the euphrates and tigris the root is obtained near the banks of ahe rivers and after being properly dried is loaded in bulk on native boats called bungalows buga lows carrying from fifty to one hundred tons which float down the river or sail if the wind is favorable or at times are towed by men as far down as Bas where the root is unloaded and pressed in bales ready for shipment |