May I, 1884.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



B^3 



nut. This is best to be done' in the rains, the first of 

 the rains. Have a basket full of good soil near the same 

 as your compost, and every morning, if any earth is washed 

 off or your nuts exposed, sprinkle on a httle earth your- 

 selves, but dou^t alloic coolies near tkeniy ant! do not handle 

 the nitis after t/ou ^v.t them down^ and I will guarantee 

 you a success. 



Captain Butler gave me this hint, and he had great 

 success at Mergui. They grow slow at first, and require 

 a deep and free subsoil near water or in a swampy sort 

 of ground, but the subsoil must be free — when they strike 

 a horizontal pan they die off sharp. 



Henaratgoda Williams sent me a nice selection of seeds : 

 Maragogipe cotfee, yellow palest variety, silver wattles, 

 black wattles, cardamoms. Bubosla crotou oil seed, Ceara 

 rubber, divi-divi, Liberian coffee. I put this in at once 

 and shall report success. I am now busy felling ; will 

 finish about the 20th instant about 40 or 50 acres. One 

 must do everything themselves here, and bo daily on the 

 spot now until I train in those " Nappie eaters." Have 

 got two wells dug and a good set of lines up, and 3S Burmese 

 and 5 Tamils at work. They make one dance a jig some- 

 times, but I must learn to bottle np and bear those 

 things. — I remain, dear sir, yours faithfully, 



JAMES D. WATSON. 



CEYLON COFFEE ESTATES AS GRAZING 

 FARMS : AN OPINION FROM CHILE. 



Edinburgh, 2nd April 1SS4. 



Dear Sir, — Annexed is an extract from a private letter 

 from Chile, South America, giving an opinion not un- 

 woithy of consideration; to me it s- earns a sensible view of 

 our " situation," in Ceylon, but liable to the reasonable 

 objections that, so loig as any hope exist of profits 

 in prospect from ''next year," proprietirs will con- 

 tinue to hwld on as long as they can. 



Besides, the purclia^e of stock and planting of 

 gra-9 &c. ri quires a lu'i^c outlay of casli ; also, many of 

 our estates are too steep and rocky to be ttmporarily 

 ciinveited into cattle-farms. Likewise, both pro 

 prietors and those who hold bonds over coffee lands 

 would oliject to give up any prospii:t!i of annual 

 pr^'tits from properties in favour of heira and successors 

 iu future generations. 



These objections could be met by certain of the 

 in' st hopeless fiehls of exhausted cofl'ee being turned 

 grass fields for the support of cattle, without giving up 

 the cultivation of the wh"le. — Yours truly, 



P. D.' MILLIE. 



" the discussions in the Ceylon papers are amusing 



to a cool, far away outsider. It is evident that a great 

 deal that they say at meetings, and write in the papers, 

 is but self-delusion. Here, large tracts of wheat lands 

 are exhausted, and I doubt if anything but weeds would 

 thrive on them. Coffee has proved itself to be an ex- 

 hausting growth ; all trees or plants which are kept under- 

 growth and weeils must be so, as whatever they yield 

 in fruit or leaves is removed. Jungle growth fertilizes itself 

 by the leaves, and rotten diliris of ages. 



" Keep the jungle cjuite clean below, and you would 

 soon see how even scrub would in ten or twenty years, 

 grow feebly where nature sows her seeds and reaps her 

 fruits for consumption on the premises — nothing is lost. 

 No doubt, heavy manuring will give you crops of anything 

 for a time, perhaps occasionally for ever, but people won't 

 inake fortunes out of land, that requires it. 



" It strikes me iu regard to unproductive coffee estates, 

 that they might be made to support their owners by turn- 

 ing them into grazing firms, sowing all available land with 

 good fodder glasses, and breeding cattle to fatten and 

 export : after a certain time, the land would become re- 

 stored and fertilized, and might aijain yield heavy crops of 

 coffee to posterity. 



** There are doubtless numerous ' new products ' avail- 

 able, but to expect debilitated soils to yield them in a pay- 

 ing manner, is Uke putting new wine into old bottles." 



T. J. W Millie. 

 106 



[To Ceylon planters the opinion from Chile will be 

 amusing. There is no export of cattle from Ceylon, only 

 a large import from India, and cuttle establishments 

 have generally been given up as costing far mure than 

 they returned. The local market for meat is limited, 

 and it will unt pay to keep cattle for matiure, as im- 

 ported grain and cultivated guinea grass at high altitudes 

 are very costly. — Ed.] 



CROPS AND SEASONS. 

 Sir, — To revive the question of crops aud seasons, 

 anyone who takes the trouble to carefully compare 

 pages .S74a and 40-5 of your new Directory will find 

 that with hardly n single exception a good coffee crop 

 follows a late burst of the monsoon and a bad one 

 an eorly burst. In the period 18G5 to 1871 the average 

 date of burst of monsoon was May 29th, the average 

 crop 956,420 cwt. In 1872 the inojisoon burst on 

 May 1st, and crop fell to 723,152 cwt. In 1858 and 

 1862 monsoon came early, and in each year the crops 

 were far under the avcrai^e. In fact, all tlirongh the 

 31 years in which the burst of tlie monsoon has been 

 recorded there is a stiiking connexion between early 

 monsoons and short; crops, late monsoons and better 

 crops. L'-t us hope this jea.- for a late monsoon. — 

 Yours faithfully, W. 



TEA MACHINERY. 



10th April 1884. 



De.\u Sik,— I have been very much interested by the 

 comTnuuicaliou iu your last issue about the American 

 " Dchydraters." Can you oblige me by letting 

 me have a circular of Mr. Hgllingsworlh's ? I am 

 writing to the Planters' Stores and Agency Company, 

 Calcutta, for the pamphlet refernd to by him. 

 As the writer calls himself special agent for Ceylon 

 also, I think hfl should lose no time to h.ave a re- 

 presentative here with full r.uthnrity. Ceylon is not 

 a little, out-of-the-way village that it ehould write to 

 Calcutta or As«am. Mr. HoUinsvvoith should jet 

 a " Ceylon Directory" for 1884 and read the Observer 

 to know the strides we are making. — Yours truly, 



AGRICOLA. 



P. S. — The Fairfield Ironworks Company should 

 not advertize that they have rolling machinery on 

 view and put phinters to the expense of going 

 down to Colombo till they really have them on view. 

 I was one of the disappointed. 



LEAF-DISEASE, NEW PRODUCTS, ETC. 

 No. II. 

 Dear Sin, — In continuation of my remarks on the 

 above subject,* I may be permitted to Mdd, that, bi'sides 

 the trees aud plants of the aloe, mudur, Calolropis 

 giffantea, the pine, and several varieties of the 

 hibiscus family, I may nientiun that fibres for cordage 

 may also be obtained from the plantain trejs, from tl~ie 

 fleshy spathe-like covering of the entire trees, but the 

 eord.age is not strong nor durable. An attempt was, I 

 think, made sometime ago by Dr. Ondaatj ■, C<'lon'ial 

 Surgwn .at present of Galle,to make piper from the 

 plantain fibres, but without success. Be^irlel all others, 

 the epidermis which lines the spathes of the liave.s of 

 varieties of the palms, besides the coconut and palmyra, 

 will make fine and strong cordage : lor instance the 

 lining of the spathes of the arecsnut tree {Acacia 

 catechu) of all others would be the best; then 'here 13 

 tht" Tucuni,/4,9(TOcarj/?(m T^(cum,a.nd Tucum:i, A. vuhjm-e. 

 It appears that from ths latter such strong materuls 

 are obtained that even hammocks are mide out of it, 

 which are sold at £3 each ; or, if ornamented with 

 featlieiy border, for twice that sum ; besides cordage 

 for bow-strings, fishing nets, &c , all that requires 



» See page 487.— Ed. 



