Pepper, a genus of plants belonging to the dianthus class. There are twenty species of piper, of which the most remarkable is the siriboa, with oval, heart-shaped, nervated leaves, and reflexed spikes. This is the plant which produces the pepper so much used in food. It is a shrub, the root of which is small, fibrous, and flexible; and it rises into a stem, which requires a tree or prop to support it. Its wood has the same sort of knots as the vine; and when it is dry, it exactly resembles the vine-branch. The leaves, which have a strong smell and a pungent taste, are of an oval shape; but they diminish towards the extremity, and terminate in a point. From the flower-buds, which are white, and are sometimes placed in the middle and sometimes at the extremity of the branches, are produced small berries resembling those of the currant-tree. Each of these contains between twenty and thirty corns of pepper. They are commonly gathered in October, and exposed to the sun seven or eight days. The fruit, which was green at first, and afterwards red, when stripped of its covering assumes the appearance it has when we see it. The largest, heaviest, and least shrivelled, is the best.

The pepper plant flourishes in the islands of Java, Sumatra, and Ceylon, and more particularly on the Malabar coast. It is not sown, but planted; and great nicety is required in the choice of the shoots. It produces no fruit until the end of three years; but bears so plentifully the three succeeding years, that some plants yield between six and seven pounds of pepper. The bark then begins to shrink; and the shrub declines so fast that in twelve years' time it ceases bearing.

The culture of pepper is not difficult. It is sufficient to plant it in a rich soil, and carefully to pull up the weeds that grow in great abundance round its roots, especially the first three years. As the sun is highly necessary to the growth of the pepper plant, when it is ready to bear, the trees that support it must be lopped, to prevent their shade from injuring the fruit. When the season is over, it is proper to crop the head of the plant. Without this precaution there would be too much wood, and little fruit.

The piper amalago, or black pepper, and the piper inequale, or long pepper of Jamaica, with some other species, are indigenous, and known by the names of joint-wood, or peppery elders. The first bears a small spike, on which are attached a number of small seeds of the size of mustard. The whole of the plant has the exact taste of the East India black pepper. The long-pepper bush grows taller than the amalago. The leaves are broad, smooth, and shining; and the fruit is similar to the long pepper of the shops, but smaller. The common people in Jamaica season their messes with the black pepper. To preserve both, the fruit may be slightly scalded when green, then dried, and wrapped in paper.