September i, 1883.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



189 



less *han last year uj) to the same date. A peculiarity of 

 this season so far as it has goue, his been the unequal dis- 

 tribution of sun and rain, continued wet weather at one time 

 and continued dry at another. 



Darjeeling.— Close and damp weather prevails here 

 which is good for the bushes hut unhealthy for the coolies; 

 consecutive days of drizzle, mist and clouds, broken only 

 rarely by a few hours morning sun ; transplanting has been 

 successfully carried on on some estates. 



KujiAON.— There has been little change here since our last, 

 except perhaps rather more rain has fallen, and the sun has 

 shewn itself less. 



Kan-gha Vallev.— Plenty of rain seems to favour this part 

 although the fall is. -ibout 14" behind last year; there has 

 been a good deal of sunshine which has brought out .some 

 Bne flushes ; the thermometer in the shade has ranged from 

 88° in the valley to 83° in the uiiper gardens. 



CniTTAGONG.— Throughout .July the weather had not been 

 favouralile ; cold south easterly winds and want of sunshme 

 being complained of ; the rainfall is about 21-44 inches 



TEA ON FLAT AND HILLY LAND. 



(To the Editor, Tropical Agriculturist.) 



1. Lanadowne Place, Cheltenham, July 27th, 1883. 

 Dkar t-iR.—Th" June number of your jjaper justto 

 hand under "Tea Culture in Darjeeling, Sylhet and 

 Ceylon" contains errors iu regard to my garden of 

 Adam Vila which you will doubtless be glad to 

 correct in the next number. 



The Tea estate of the Adam Tila Association has 200 

 acres of tea, of which 80 acres arc iu full bearing and 

 which gave last jear 88.5 maunds of tea, which I 

 believe to be ihe season'.s maximum, in fact the 

 maximum outturn ever turned out over as much as 

 89 acres. Of the 89 acres, 54 acres are flat and 35 

 acres are hilly : the former ivportcd to be the finest 

 piec3 of tea in existence, and the 35 hilly is very 

 second rate. I have not k.pt details of outturn on 

 Hat andtelah separately, but my experience over S 

 years leads ine to es'imate the outturn over the ,35 

 acres at a maximum of 5 maunds pur acre or 400 lb. On 

 this basis the flats of 54 acres gave a total of 710 maunds 

 or just 10 mauuels or 1,040 lb. per acre. I may men- 

 tion that in oue iilucking during last season one 

 portion of the flat gave G maunds oi leaf per aero 

 --=U m:.unds or 120 lb. tea. Then as to expend- 

 iture I lueutioned tliat w e-timated in 1SS3 to lay 

 down our tea in Cidcu'ta auctions inclusive of sale 

 charges in Calcutta at 5-8 per lb., on which \ve 

 of course hope to make reduction as a larger area 

 comes into liearing. As to lab.ur, Sylhet is doubtless 

 amongst the most favoured iu India, probablv second 

 only toDaijeeling, Terai and Doo:ii8. X am not abso- 

 lutely cert^iin th.vt 5i annas is the estimate at which the 

 Calcutta tirm set th'e cost of their tea landed in Cal- 

 cutta. I am inclined to think it is possibly even lower. 

 If you will insert what I liave above noted in connection 

 witb what you taid in the June number you w411 

 do good to me individually and the Tea Industry 

 genei ally. —Yours faiihlully, 



BENRY A, BROWN CONSTABLE, 

 yOT CONSTABLE BROWN. 

 [Our information was obtained from an Indian tea 

 planter and the f|uestion started was the cost of 

 draining and bringing the 11. t land into cultivation. 

 The return of tea mentioned is firstrate, but in- 

 formation as to the cost per acre from Hrst to last 

 would be useful. In Ccyhm we find that tea does 

 well on very steep featured lands.— Ed.] 



AUSTRALIA: THE NORTHERN TERRITORY 

 VVe are sending a first-class collection of minerals 

 to the Calcutta Exhibition, including specimens of 

 golden ejuartz, argentifero.i? talena, and other silver 

 ores, and magnificent samijles o£ stream and lode tin, 

 io 



I am sorry to say that our private plantations will 

 not be represented, though Mr. Ilullz, of the Govern- 

 ment Gardens, is sending a collection of vegetable 

 oils, cotton, tapicca, indigo, and other tropical products 

 which will be sufficient to show th.-it such can be 

 produced in the Territory. Consideiing that Mr. 

 Holtz has but the crudest methods of extracting the 

 oils — obtained from teil seed and peanuts — anei for 

 the manufacture of the indigo, his exhibits reflect greae 

 credit upon him. The n o-t ab.surd collection sent 

 is a variety of woods, highly polished, and made to 

 look as if we had some of the finest timber in the 

 world. These specimens have been got from the im- 

 mediate neighbourhood e'f Paluierston, and I believe 

 that a similar lot could not be got again in twelve 

 months' time. Any one who has travelled the Territ- 

 ory knows that it is about the worst timber-pro- 

 ducing country on the coast of Australia, and it is, I 

 think, not right to eend a few picked specimens of 

 ornamental anel other woods to an Exhibition without 

 giving an account of their scarcity, kutwing well that 

 if any one interested in timber was to pay us a visit 

 with the view of opening up a traele that «e could not 

 load a vessel up in twelve months. I do not think it 

 is an exaggeration to say that there are more valu- 

 able woods in five square miles of a southern timber 

 scrub than in the Northern Territory altogether. True, 

 we have plenty of gnarled and knotted inangvove and 

 if lumberers waut it we could well spare it — South 

 Australian Rerjiiter. 



BKAZIL : THE EMANCIPATION LAW. 



It is nejw nearly twelve years since the adoption o£ 

 the emancipation law of 1871, a period which ought to 

 determine both the efficiency of its provisions for the 

 extinction of slavery in Brazil and the sincerity of its 

 promoters who saw advantages in it far greater than 

 those which any other scheme could oiler. In the 

 absence of trustworthy statistics it is iinpoEsible to 

 deteriuinc, however, just what these results have been. 

 In some provinces the returns are more or less defective, 

 anel iu three — I'.irahyba, SiTo I'aulo and Matto Grosso 

 — the movements of the slave population are wholly 

 lacking. So far as they have been obtained, however, 

 these statistics warrant two conclusions: (1) the law 

 has failiel to secure the results anticipated, and (2) 

 there is really very little popular sympathy with its 

 aims .inrl operations. The first of these conclusions ia 

 warranteel by the fact that with un expenditure of 

 over ten thousanel coutos during the nine years since 

 the close of matriculation iu 1873, including the i er- 

 sonal contributions of the slaves themselves, only 

 12,f-98 slaves have been hberated through the oper- 

 ations of the fund created by that law. This in an 

 average of only 1,433 per annum in a slave population 

 of over a million and a half when the law went iuto 

 effect. The second conclusion ie warranteel by the 

 causes proeUicing the Krst, by the absence of statistical 

 returns, and by tl:e general apathy and indifference 

 regarding the subject, except when opposition is aroused 

 by some exceptional advance on the part of the few 

 abolitionists of the country. 



Imperfect as they are, the statistics on this question 

 give cause for serious dissatisfaction. The emancipation 

 of slavery in this country is not a question to be 

 trilleel with, not only as a matter of internal economy, 

 but also as a matter of international honor. 



The existence of slavery is clearly the e,iufe of many, 

 very many of the ills which afiiict the country, and is 

 still not only a source of serious danger but is an 

 obstacle to all real advancement. The prescut situ- 

 ation of Brazil is sncli that every delay in r.chieving 

 the eui.ancipalion of slavery and its substitution by free, 

 voluntary labor, is not only dangerous but is positively 

 uicidal, An increasing publ'C expenditure and public 



