;7o 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[October i, 1883. 



omer's half of the profit, which leaves Is oil. Thea 

 subtract Is 3d for the shopkeeper's half (Is od in Is 

 5d will go once aud two over), ihat leaves 21. Now 

 iso't that •2d what the tea costs? And isn't the profit 

 oa a pouud of '2s Sd tea exactly is 6M. I s.-ty ic is ; 

 and hive worked it out on my slate. Bill says it is 

 all bosb. Please, sir, 1 aui top in the secimd class, and 

 shall be up in the first tomorrow ; Bill is only bottom 

 iu the third class. — I am, &o.. Buttons, Dowlai*." 



Cacuak. 

 — Home and Colonial ifail. 



TEA CULTIVATION IN DABJILING. 

 Mr. Owen's letters have lad us to look up the rough 

 pencilled notes we made during a visit to the DarjL- 

 liug tea estates so long ago as March 1S76, — seven- 

 aud-a-half years ago. From time to time we utilized 

 iu the Observe!' the informatiou obtained, but our 

 notes were never regularly "extended." In those days 

 there was no milway and the chief means of convey- 

 ance consisted of Sikhim and Thibetan ponies, for 

 which, to cirry themselves and their baggage upwards 

 trom Silligori, travellers were depeudent on old White 

 of the Hotel at Kurseoug : quite a character in his 

 way. Tea, lead and o:hei' traffic upwards and tea 

 downwards were carried by the short but wonderfully 

 stout-limbed " paharris " or hill men, and the losds 

 of Icul they took up were wonderful. We should cot 

 like to name the weight a man carried, strapped 

 to his back, while his ouly mode of resting was by 

 means of a bamboo, the pointed end of which was in- 

 serted into the roadway or grouuii, while the other 

 end supported the load. In resting, the men gave 

 forth a respiration of pout-up breath, with a loud 

 whistle. The coolies on the tea esiates were lua nly 

 Nepaulese, whose lirst work on a new estate was to 

 bnUd themselves huts with the prevalent bamboo and 

 long grass. Their money wages was low, K5 50, but 

 selected " tea-makers " were paid R6 up to RI2 per 

 mensem. The women, stout aud strong, generiily .iid 

 their full sh.ire of hoeing as well as oiher tieldwork, 

 and it was curious to see a woman who sturdily plied 

 the hoe, with a necklace on composed of perhaps K 100 

 strung together and whit^ and pink magnolia blossoms 

 in her ha.r. Daughters a:e a source of wealth to a 

 semi-Mongolian cooly, for " the custom of t'ne country" 

 is th.at each suitor pays the happy father RUO before 

 he obtains liis bride. With m.ichmery provided, one 

 cooly per cultivated acre was deemed sudicient. A 

 Europeuu assistant was deemed requisite for every 

 800 maunds of iea produced. " A g'lod burn " was 

 desiderated, as the ground is wholly elfared of stump?, 

 &c. The cost of cultivation we Cud noted as li52 per 

 acre for the first year, aud K30 per acre per annum 

 subsequently. We were told that in the fonrth year 

 an estate ought to be "clear" [of debt] and worth 

 £31 an aei-f. The odd i"l is conous, and our remark 

 on the estimate of value was " far too low," while it 

 was clear to us that the estate could not have possi- 

 bly "cleared itself" in the fourth year. If it did so 

 in twice four years, the result would be very good. 

 We were told that "2 Ih, of charcoal, costing 3 to 12 

 annas (5 a fair average) pt-r niuund, were consumed 

 for every lb. of tea prepared. Large reserves of forest 

 for charcoal and tea boxes werf deemed necessary, and 

 Mr. Owen has shewn that £tiU further reserves are in 

 some cases placed at the disposal of coolies for the 

 growth of f jod crops. We find we had noted in regard 

 to labour " Lower [ Terrai] estates not so well supplied 

 with labour. Regular monthly payments and no ad- 

 vance:. Bad (ysteiu of payment through Sildsi'j 



generijl." One of our notes is that each chest of tea 

 cost R2 for conveyance to Calcutta, but we should 

 think the actual cost of transit must have been con- 

 siderably more. As iu Ceylon, eo in Darjiliug, pre- 

 ference was given to forest land, but as a matter of 

 fact, large areas of "chen.ied" or " joomed " land 

 were cultivated, the seed b*iug dibbled in at stake. 

 From a remark made by Mr. douthby of vSelim estate, 

 when wo visited a Terrai property under his charge, 

 that '■ holes had been made for every plant," it was 

 evident that dibbling was the common mode of plant- 

 ing, and no doubt, it answered fairly in the black 

 free soil, previously well hoed. In sowing at stake, 

 so many as .«ix seeds were actually, sometimes sown 

 together aud the temptation was often great to allow 

 the resulting plants to grow up. But three seeds to 

 each stake was evidently the gene al rule, for w-e find 

 amongst our notes, " each cooly should put iu per 

 diem 600 seecls at 200 stakes." We 'find added, 

 " even if planting at stake is adopted, large nurseries 

 will be needed to till up vacancies." So that with even 

 3 seeds to each stike, there were not suHicient plants 

 to prevent vacancies. We saw black grub very bad 

 on a low estate, but we suspect the great cause 

 of vacancies is the climate : 150 inches of ra;u 

 or even 200 iu 4 or 5 months and then, too 

 frequenily protracted drought. On the occasion of our 

 visit to Darjiling, no rain had fallen for ue.aily eight 

 months ; the " jorahs " [ravines] wei-e waterless ; 

 cholera was rife aud we :uid other visitors were de- 

 prived of a sigiit of Kinchinjmiga, by the smoke which 

 Mose from hundreds of " joomiug " fires, the bam- 

 bus incessantly exploding with a noise like artillery. 

 During that dreadful seascu tires ou tea estates were 

 common and destructive. Tea bushes, however, are 

 not so liable to injury by fire as coUee bushes are. 

 If burnt down they spring up again. When tea trees 

 are very old. they renew after being cut dovra, but 

 ai'e not equal to what they were in their prune. One 

 of our notes which now perhaps requires a ?, is that 

 " the best tea is yielded by young bushes." Going 

 on with our notes without much regard to system, 

 we find we were told that " seven months' plants should 

 be eight inches high ; that plants to supply vacan- 

 cies should have balls of earth attached to them and 

 that the tap roots should not be injured." We added, 

 " Mr. Cave's idea that transplanted tea bushes are 

 more liable [than those planted in sitn] to run to seed, 

 is no doubt true. " Any shock increases the instinctive 

 tendency to perpetuate the kind. To quoe again : — 

 " Manuring or addition of soil to steep land is 

 imlespcnsable, especially if the soil be a red one. 

 Deep hoeing practised, the feeding roots of the tea 

 plant, not being so near the surface as those of 

 coHlh;." [The hoeing is not, however, permitted to 

 approach too close to the root stem.] "Four-pronged 

 forks seem preferable to'kodalies, although pei'- 

 haps not so much Wvrk Kot thvough with the forks. '' 

 There were and we suppose there are no weeeling 

 contracts, iu a region where weeds, or as the local 

 terra is, "jungle" are permitted to grow for a por- 

 tion of the year at least, side by side with the tea, 

 Some of our notes are significant : " Objection to 

 terracing, that weeds are left to grow on the outer 

 1 edge." [So it is iu .Java ] Aud ag-aiu : — " Tall rank 

 I ' jungle ' [ehietly iluk] not to be allowed to grow 

 ' about the plants to make them gro.v lanky." We 

 1 should certaiuly say in Ceylon, •' by no manner of 

 ' means," if we except Mr. llaliiley and a few of his 

 j schooL Further; — " Terraces should not be more ih.-in 

 tluce to threeand-half feet wide, or the trees will 

 I get into the subsoil." Close phuitiug, especially iu 

 ' the rows was the rule, ignorance aud inexperience 

 at the couuneucement having led amongst other erroi^ 

 ' to the pkiutiug of China tea so wide apart as * >; S 

 I We saw some wonderfully -sized trees so gi"o«u on 



