The pepper-vine is, in its own climate, a hardy plant, growing readily from cuttings or layers, rising in several knotted stems, twining round any neighbouring support, and adhering to it by fibres that shoot from every joint at intervals of six to ten inches, and from which it probably derives a share of its nourishment. If suffered to run along the ground these fibres would become roots; but in this case (like the ivy) it would never exhibit any appearance of fructification, the prop being necessary for encouraging it to throw out its bearing shoots. It climbs to the height of twenty or twenty-five feet, but thrives best when restrained to twelve or fifteen, as in the former case the lower part of the vine bears neither leaves nor fruit, whilst in the latter it produces both from within a foot of the ground. The stalk soon becomes ligneous, and in time acquires considerable thickness. The leaves are of a deep green and glossy surface, heart-shaped, pointed, not pungent to the taste, and have but little smell. The branches are short and brittle, not projecting above two feet from the stem, and separating readily at the joints. The blossom is small and white, the fruit round, green when young and full-grown, and turning to a bright red when ripe and in perfection. It grows abundantly from all the branches in long small clusters of twenty to fifty grains, somewhat resembling bunches of currants, but with this difference, that every grain adheres to the common stalk, which occasions the cluster of pepper to be more compact, and it is also less pliant. MODES OF PROPAGATING IT. The usual mode of propagating the pepper is by cuttings, a foot or two in length, of the horizontal shoots that run along the ground from the foot of the old vines (called lado sulur), and one or two of these are planted within a few inches of the young chinkareen at the same time with it if of the long kind, or six months after if of the short kind, as before described. Some indeed prefer an interval of twelve months; as in good soil the luxuriancy of the vine will often overpower and bear down the prop, if it has not first acquired competent strength. In such soil the vine rises two or three feet in the course of the first year, and four or five more in the second, by which time, or between the second and third year of its growth, it begins to show its blossom (be-gagang), if in fact it can be called such, being nothing more than the germ of the future bunch of fruit, of a light straw colour, darkening to green as the fruit forms. These germs or blossoms are liable to fall untimely (gugur) in very dry weather, or to be shaken off in high winds (although from this accident the gardens are in general well sheltered by the surrounding woods), when, after the fairest promise, the crop fails. TURNING DOWN THE VINES.