266 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[October i, 1883, 



tliree planters had been engaged by a Calcutta firm 

 for a term of years to work in tea gardens, the salaries 

 were stated, and I think a remai'k was made that they 

 appeared liberal, and that the gentlemen in question 

 were fortunate in being offered them. I cannot but 

 think that this remark was made without due 

 weight being given to the conditions of life 

 in an Indian upcountry district. It must be 

 rememljered first that in the plains water is as a 

 rule undrinkable even after the most careful filtering, 

 whilst the cost of aerated waters, an absolute neces- 

 sity, is very great when they have to be transported 

 from Calcutta as is usually tlie case. Servants too 

 are a gi'eat tax on an assistant's income; "boys" to 

 do the cooking and all the other work of a small 

 bungalow are unkno\v^l, and several servants must be 

 kept whose salaries thougli individually not higher 

 than what is generally paid in Ceylon, amount in the 

 aggi'egate to a large sum. I'au'ly generous living and 

 good cooking are essential to the preservation of 

 health in a ti-ying climate, and how impossible it 

 is for these conditions to be fulfilled on the salaries 

 mentioned, I now know well. European managers 

 and assistants are very highly paid on Indian tea 

 gardens, aud they thoroughly deserve the remunera- 

 tion they receive. A young man from home on first 

 joining gets, of course, a small salary R150 a mouth 

 and several allowances generally, and has to manage 

 as he can on it ; but good experienced men in charge 

 of good gardens get from K500 to R700 a month 

 and a commission on the jirofits, which some- 

 times ranges as liigh as 10 per cent in addition ; 

 in the smaller gardens K350 and E400 and commis- 

 sion are very generally given on the plains. The reason 

 of this is that in order to live in such a way as 

 to have a fair prospect of jn-eserving his healtli a 

 man mast have an income of this kind, and must 

 spend a considerable proportion of it. I cannot there- 

 fore agree that the sums offered the gentlemen in 

 question, considering that they had experience of 

 estate management and were accustomed to cooly 

 labour, were specially liberal, and this opinion was 

 endorsed by several Indian planters who had heai-d 

 of the engagements. There are, of course, some parts of 

 the plains more healthy than others, and it is to be 

 hoped that they have been fortunate in the locality 

 to which they were eent. 



As is very generally known, most of the Dar- 

 jiliug hill gardens, and some portion of those in 

 the Teiai. are planted with China tea. In 

 Assam on the other hand, a few gardens have China 

 on them, but they are the exception. The opinion 

 mentioned in a previous letter as having been given 

 by a leading Calcutta teataster, that a malty 

 flavoured tea was oidy to be made from highclass 

 indigenous plant, I have found to be quite erroneous. 

 There is no question that at high elevations very 

 choice havoury teas are made from China leaf, many 

 of them fetching the highest prices in the market ; 

 and in some situations, wbere the cold is great, hybrid 

 plants do not yield in the same way as the 

 hardy China bush. Extreme altitude apart, hy- 

 brid bushes are foimd to yield much more 

 heavily in the hills than China, and the fact that the 

 latter was so vei-y extensively planted in the old days 

 of tea planting is very generally regarded as a mis- 

 fortune. In appeai'ance the tea from a China bush is, 

 of course, far superior to any other. The proportion of 

 pekoe is very large, and there is not much coarse 

 uneven leaf. The liquor has a very fine flavour, but 

 not much strength. In some cases I was able to samjile 

 teas fi'om China aud hybrid buslies, grown on the same 

 estate, and the latter was invariably the better tea of 

 the two. The vei-y high and cold portions of gardens 

 apart, all new clearings are being planted wdth a 

 good hardy hybrid. 



The opinions expressed by planters as to the cause 

 of the peculiar ma'.ty flavour, so much valued by brokers, 

 possessed by some teas are varied and contradictory. 

 In Calcutta, highclass iilant and fine soil were given 

 as the conditions, but many such teas have not got 

 it, whilst in one case a tea from the rankest CSiina 

 had it in a marked degree. Another cause assigned 

 was highfuing, but teas dried in a Gibbs aud Bariy's 

 di'ier at a temperature of 700' had not got it. Blighted 

 leaf, the stunted shoots from bushes suifeiing from 

 "gi-een fly" especially, was said to give a malty liquor 

 by another, but I think this is questiouahle. A fom-th 

 planter of exi)erience stated that by manipidatiou he 

 could always produce teas of this character ; a reference 

 to the pulilio sales of tea from his garden was con. 

 elusive proof against this statement. An instance was 

 given me of a garden in the Terai, which for a few 

 years, when young produced fine malty teas fetching 

 a high price, but afterwards they entirely lost this 

 characteristic, and it seems most probable that some 

 quality in the eoil is the chief cause. There is an 

 immense amount to be learned yet about tea manu- 

 facture, and this point is one which is not as yet 

 understood. 



In Assam and the Terai, in all low-lying districts 

 in fact, the success of gardens is known to depend 

 entirely on the class of plant put out. In the early 

 days of planting any thing was considered good enough, 

 but now the very greatest care is taken in selecting 

 seed, aud the highest prices are paid for it. In the 

 lowcouutry, seed from cultivated indigenous As5am 

 trees is the best kind to plant. Seed from the original 

 Jungle trees is very delicate and not so suitable for 

 cultivation as the second generation. The lowest price 

 at which such seed can be obtained is R150 (one hundred 

 and fifty rupees) per maund, and much has been sold at 

 R'200. It is all bought locally, aud in opening gardens 

 in Assam and Cachar the first consideration is "how 

 much eeed can be alf jrded ? " Then the acreage to be 

 cleared is decided on. 



There are two principal sources from which 

 seed is obtained, the Towkok and Singloo 

 indigenous gardens, but all is booked for a 

 long time to come locally at such prices as I have 

 quoted. From gardens which have not made a re- 

 putation as seed-producers, the very lowest figure 

 at which high class indigenous seed can be ob- 

 tained is R120, and when a man shows you a nurs- 

 ery in which such seed is sown he does so apolo- 

 getically, seed worth R150 per maund locally being 

 the recognized kind suitable for the plains. In sampling 

 teas from the ordinary hybrid and indigenous plant, 

 the difference was as marked as that between 

 China aud hybrid in the hills, the indigenous giving a 

 much stronger and more rasping liquor than the 

 other. In yield, the advantage is even greater (in 

 one garden the China gave two maunds, the hybrid 

 8 maunds per acre), aud one of the finest sights I saw 

 was a live-year old garden from Singloo seed with 

 a heavy flush on it. When talking about seed to 

 men in Assam, remarks were often made re- 

 garding the planting of cheap inferior seed sent to 

 CcyloD, and cases were mentioned of seed picked 

 anyhow from low class bushes, to supply orders for 

 seed at abiur.lly low rates. Plenty of good seed has 

 cone to Ceylon of course, where fair prices have been 

 paid, but, with tbe large extensions in tea now going 

 on in Itidia itself, Ceylon men cannot expect to get 

 good seed for an inadequate price. Noacacherry, the 

 place from which Rookwood, New Forest, and some 

 other places in Ceylon got their seed, is known 

 as one of th.^ best sources for hybrid seed of a high- 

 class in Assam. 



Indigenous Assam seed, though undoubtedly the 

 right plant for the Ceylon low country, is by no means 

 suited for plantng on the hills; a vigorous dark- 



