348 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[November i, 1883. 



the use of the tea-spoon in measviring the quantity put into 

 the tea-pot. Intlian teas are certainly much stronger than 

 Ohiua teas. To those who adhere to their accustomed num- 

 ber of spoons-full, the extra strength is often ag.-iinst Indian 

 teas, as it appears never to occur to the good people to put 

 less in the pot ! By sending home big-leaf teas, so much less 

 in weight would go to the spoon-full that possibly the pre- 

 judice as to excessive strength would be heard less of m 

 future. 



One may have one's own views as to the quality of soil and 

 the judicious selection of site necessary for economic tea 

 cultivation. Nooks and corners may do %'ery well for teas 

 for the use of the peasants' own houseliold in Japan, but it 

 strikes me that I recollect seeing some very fau' sized 

 patches of tea-cultivation in Japan a few years ago. But 

 the statement that each farmer can raise enough tea from 

 ten or twelve bushes to meet the wants of a family of eight 

 persons set me making calculations. Tliis is the result. I 

 took a list of thirteen of the leading Assam gardens, and 

 added up their yield per acre, and dirided the sum by 

 thirteen to get an average of the yield per acre iuAssam. 

 I find this is to be 357 9-13 lb. Let us say 350 lb. for the 

 sake of argument. Let us allow 16 square feet to each bush ; 

 that woiUd in round numbers give us about 2,700 bushes 

 per acre. According to this it would take between seven and 

 eight bushes to produce a pound of tea in the best tea cli- 

 mate in the world. Thus at his outside limit of twelve 

 bushes, our contemporary considers the allowance for a family 

 of eight persons to be 1^ lb. of tea for their year's supply 

 or 2oz. per )H£«s«H. Perhaps some one may care to carry 

 the analysis further, and tell me what fraction of a leaf 

 this would allow per caput, per diem. The planter-reader will 

 doubtless find his mterest in the above extract fully kept 

 up to the end. It is not intended " to be read sarcastic " 

 by the writer it is perhaps necessary to state. 



« » « * * 



One result of the growth in popularity of Indian tea 

 at home is to be found in the circumstauces_ that a cup of 

 tea which tastes hke tea is not so rare as it was in res- 

 taurants and tea .shops. One company, which owns a num- 

 ber of shops in and about London, opened originally for 

 the sale of piu-o bread, has vastly added to its trade by 

 selliug tea and cottee of drinkable kind. This latter branch 

 of the business has grown mainly because Intlian tea has 

 been largely used, and the coffee has been really well, 

 made. 



« 



THE ASSAM COMPANY. 

 Your directors lay before you a report on the opera- 

 tions of the Assam Company for the year ending Mist 

 December, 18S2. The quantity of tea packed aiuoimted 

 to 2,:iU4,8071b., which was 297,393 lb. less than the super- 

 intendent's estimate. The expenditure durhig the year 

 ■was £112,435, being £8,325 less than the superintendents, 

 estimates. It will thus be seen that the cost of produc- 

 tion in India was 11 |d. per lb., against lOJd per lb. for 

 the previous year. This increase is to be regretted, but 

 it is attributable to the short quantity of tea made. The 

 trees have now recovered fi'om the severe damage that 

 they sustained, and the whole of the plant has been main- 

 tained in eflicient working order. The results of the yeai- 

 stand thus : — 



lieccipts. 



Tea sales, net proceeds £110,371 13 1 



Tea seed sold in IncUa 6,599 9 8 



Suncby receipts in India 1,409 9 o 



Interest and sundries 284 13 9 



£124,605 5 11 

 Oiillai/, 

 Exi)enditure in India in 



rupees at par . . £112,435 7 2 

 Less Exchange . . 13,600 7 4 



£98,834 19 10 

 Expenditui'e in 

 England , . £ 7,893 9 4 



Total cxpeuditm-e £106,7 28 9 2 

 Net profit ,,,,,,,,,,..... ^17,936 16 9 



The profit this year amounts as above to £17,936 16s 9d 

 to which is to be added the sum of £1,017 6s 9d balance of 

 undivided profit fi-om last year, making a total of £18,954 

 3s 6d which enables the dii-ectors to pay a dividend of 10 

 per cent, for the year and to carry £238 3s 6d forward. 



Comparing the results of 1882 with those of 1881, it \vill 

 be seen that wliile the crop is less by 01,086 lb. the garden 

 expenditure has increased by £8,770 9s 9d so that the cost 

 of the tea laid down in London is about Is 7-16d per lb. 

 including all charges. The margin of profit made is Id. 

 per lb., which gives £9,643. The seed, &c., yield the 

 balance, £8,293, or say 5 per cent, from tea and 5 per cent, 

 from tea seed, &c. — Home and Colonial M/iil, 



THE TEA TRADE OF CHINA. 



In the series of commercial reports by Her Majest;y's 

 Consuls in China, just issued, there are some interesting 

 particulars on the general state of the tea trade at the 

 treaty ports. Mr. G. Jamieson, Consul at Kiukiang, statea 

 that the tea crop of 1S82 proved to he above the average, 

 both as to quality and quantity. High prices were paid for 

 the earlier and choicer kinds, and the outturn to the 

 foreign exporter was, on the whole, favourable, or, perhaps, 

 to put it more accurately, less disastrous than in many 

 previous years. Buyers inChiua are slow to appreciate the 

 fact that owing to the Indian competitiou, common China 

 teas will not bear anything like the prices that used to be 

 paid ten or fifteen years ago. Every year, as the tea 

 season comes round, warnings and expostulations con- 

 tinue to be addressed to them, but somehow the 

 desire not to be outdone by one's neighbour, or 

 that perennial hope which is ever rising in the tea 

 market as elsewhere, caiTies men beyond the bounds of 

 prudence. Common congou has often been sold in London 

 of late years at prices which it is calculated would not 

 cover the bare outlay for laboiu' in China. Mr. R. J. 

 Forrest, reporting on the trade at the port of Amoy, says 

 it would seem that unless the quahty of Amoy teas is 

 improved their production for export to the United States 

 must gradually cease. At the jnices reahsed for about 

 half the crop of the past season (that is all the lowest 

 grades) the teas did not pay for the cost of pickmg and 

 packing ; and so discouraged are the native hongs interested 

 in this trade that the majority of them are giving it up 

 entirely. The gradually lessening prices that have ruled 

 for these teas for some years past have left the growers so 

 impoverished that they have not funds to provide the cost 

 of tbe care of the plantations, which is so absolutely necess- 

 ary in order to obtain tea of good q\iality.— //o»ic and 

 Coloitial Mail. 



Tub riii.sT Paudv Cuoi- in Bmmali has bctn har- 

 vested, and the second crops of cereals and vege- 

 tables have been benefited by two days' heavy rain. — 

 Madraif Mail, Sept. '^yth. 



The J£S.SIB Estate.— On Satuiday last the Official 

 Assignee sold by auctiou the casuarin a plantation kuowa 

 as the Jessie Estate, at Eunore, the property of the late 

 Mr. Augustus Arathoon. The estate wbs purchased 

 by L>r. Currie, for K7, 500. -i/orfcas Mail, Oct. 2ad. 



Im>ian and LorAL Tha Sked. — A planter, who 

 has lately received seed from India and from plants 

 locally grown, the results of seed from India of good jat, 

 reports the locally grown feed as so much smaller in 

 size than that direct Ironi India, and that the number o£ 

 seeds in a mauud of the locally grown exceeded by 

 at leust SO per cent the luuuber in a mauud from 

 India. Does tlie amaller size of the seed at all indicate 

 deterioration ? or how can the fact be explained ? Have 

 any other planters inelituted comparisons ? 



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