Hemp is produced from the bark of a species of the plantain-tree, forests of which are found growing wild in some provinces of the Philippines. The operation of making it is simple enough, the most important of the process apparently being the separation of the fibres from each other by an iron instrument, resembling a comb for the hair. After drying in the sun, and undergoing several other processes, with the minutiae of which I am unacquainted, it is made up into bales, weighing 280 lbs. each, and in that state is shipped for Manilla, where, after being picked more or less white, which is dependent entirely upon the purposes it is intended to serve, and the markets it has to be sent to, it is again pressed into bales of the same weight as before, although of much less bulk, and is exported, the greater quantity of it going to the United States of America, as the export tables will show. The best hemp is of a long and fine white fibre, very well dried, and of a silky gloss. The dark coloured is not so well liked, and if too bad for exportation, is generally made up into ropes for the colonial shipping, or sent down to Singapore for transhipment to Calcutta, where it is employed for the same purpose. The best hemp comes from Sorsogon and Leyte, and some of the Cebu is also very good. Albay, Camarines, Samar, Bisayas, and some other districts, are those from which it principally comes. The freight on hemp shipped by American vessels to the United States, is reckoned at the rate of 40 cubic feet, or four bales of 10 feet each, to the ton; but when shipped to Great Britain, the freight is generally calculated at the ton of 20 cwt., or 2,240 lbs. avoirdupois. Annexed is a table of calculations of what it will cost if put on board a ship in Manilla Bay, including all charges, and 5 per cent. paid to an agent there for purchasing it, &c.