52 



copper sulphate in a piece of coarse sacking, and hang this by a 

 stick laid across the top of the barrel so as to be just beneath the 

 surface of the water until it has slowly dissolved. 



In another barrel slack 4 lbs. of lime very slowly and carefully, 

 at first only adding about a quart of water at a time, until a per- 

 fectly smooth paste free from grit is obtained, add water to make 

 the whole 25 gallons and wait until cool. Now pour both together 

 into a cask holding 50 gallons. The milk of lime should be 

 thoroughly stirred before pouring, and finally the mixture should 

 be well stirred for 4 or 5 minutes with a wooden paddle. If not 

 perfect, the mixture is liable to injure the foliage and in order to 

 test this, put the blade of a penknife into the mixture and leave it 

 for I or 2 minutes. If there is any deposit of copper on the blade 

 showing a brownish colour, it is not safe to use it, and more lime 

 must be added until the knife is not discoloured. 



EXPERIMENTS WITH SUGAR CANE IN BRITISH 



GUIANA. 



Notes of a paper by Prof. Harrison, read at the Agricultural Conference 

 in Trinidad, January, 1 90S, on " Recent progress of agricultural ex- 

 periments in British Guiana. 



(a) Older varieties of sugar cane. — The results of 1 5 years experi- 

 ments show that taking the yield of Bourbon as lOO, the values of 

 the better kinds were : — 



White Transparent ... 100 



Mani ... ... 100 



Po-a-ole ... ... 98.5 



Red Ribbon ... 94.4 



&c. &c. 



None of these varieties on the large scale equal in productive- 

 ness the Bourbon, besides they have defects either from the cul- 

 tural or the manufacturing point of view or from both. 



Few of these varieties are now to be found in the colony. 

 Against 65, 608 acres or Bourbon in 1903-4 there were only 2,8/6 

 of White Transparent, and experiments with these varieties have 

 now been discontinued. 



(b) Neiver varieties raised from seed. — In British Guiana we have 

 raised about \ million of canes, and have selected some 26,000 for 

 field experiments. Out of these we have selected a few hundreds 

 for continued experiments, and from them the planters have se- 

 lected a very few, say 50 varieties, as being possibly of value. 

 Out of that 50, about one dozen show promise of being of actual 

 value. 



On an area of 35 acres preliminary small scale experiments are 

 carried on, selecting the parent varieties first ; then the vigorous 

 seedlings ; third culturally ; fourth, analytically ; fifth, repeating 

 third and fourth methods with second and third ratoons ; sixth, 

 growing on plots of l-20th acre under identical conditions, and 

 then selecting about one-fourth of third or fourth ratoons ; seven- 



