CLOVES  , the dried, unexpanded

flower-buds of Eugenia caryophyllata, a tree belonging to the natural order Myrtaceae . They are so named from the French word clou, on account of their resemblance to a nail . The clove tree is a beautiful evergreen which grows to a height of from 30 to 40 ft., having large oval leaves and crimson flowers in numerous groups of terminal clusters . The flower-buds are at first of a pale colour and gradually become green, after which they develop into a bright red, when they are ready for collecting . Cloves are rather more than half an inch in length, and consist of a long cylindrical°calyx, terminating in four spreading sepals, and four unopened petals which form a small ball in the centre . The tree is a native of the small group of islands in the Indian Archipelago called the Moluccas, or Spice Islands; but it was long cultivated by the Dutch in Amboyna and two or three small neighbouring islands . Cloves were one of the principal Oriental spices that early excited the cupidity of Western commercial communities, having been the basis of a rich and lucrative trade from an early part of the Christian era . The Portuguese, by doubling the Cape of Good Hope, obtained possession of the principal portion of the clove trade, which they continued to hold for nearly a century, when, in 16o5, they were expelled from the Moluccas by the Dutch . That power exerted great and inhuman efforts to obtain a complete monopoly of the trade, attempting to extirpate all the clove trees growing in their native islands, and to concentrate the whole production in the Amboyna Islands . With great difficulty the French succeeded in introducing the clove tree into Mauritius in the year 1770; subsequently the cultivation was introduced into Guiana, Brazil, most of the West Indian Islands and Zanzibar . The chief commercial sources of supply are now Zanzibar and its neighbouring island Pemba on the East African coast, and Amboyna . Cloves are also grown in Java, Sumatra, Reunion, Guiana and the West India Islands .

Cloves as they come into the

market have a deep brown colour, a powerfully fragrant odour, and a taste too hot and acrid to be pleasant . When pressed with the nail they exude a volatile oil with which they are charged to the unusual pro-portion of about 18 % . The oil is obtained as a commercial product by submitting the cloves with water to repeated distillation . It is, when new and properly prepared, a pale yellow or almost colourless fluid, becoming after some time of a brown colour; and it possesses the odour and taste peculiar to cloves . The essential oil of cloves—the Oleum Caryophylli of the British Pharmacopoeia—is a mixture of two substances, one of which is oxidized, whilst the other is not . Eugenol, or eugenic acid, C10H1202, is the chief constituent . It is capable of forming definite salts . The other constituent is a hydro-carbon C15H24, of which the distilling point differs from that of eugenol, and which solidifies only with intense cold . Oil of cloves is readily soluble in alcohol and ether, and has a specific gravity of about 1.055 . Its dose is 1-3 minims . Besides this oil, cloves also contain two neutral bodies, eugenin and caryophyllin, the latter of which is an isomer of camphor . They are of .no practical importance .

The British

Pharmacopoeia contains an infusion of cloves (Infusum Caryophylli), of which the strength is 1. part in 40 of boiling water and the dose z-1 oz . Cloves are employed principally as a condiment in culinary operations, in confectionery, and in the preparation of liqueurs . In medicine they are tonic and carminative, but they are little used except as adjuncts to other substances on account of their flavour, or with purgatives to prevent nausea and griping . The essential oil forms a convenient medium for using cloves for flavouring purposes, it possesses the medicinal properties characteristic of a volatile oil, and it is frequently employed to relieve toothache . Oil of cloves is regarded by many dental surgeons as the most effective local anaesthetic they possess in cases where it is desired, before cutting a sensitive tooth for the purpose of filling it, to lower the sensibility of the dentine . For this purpose the cavity must be exposed to cotton wool saturated with the oil for about ten days .