236 



THE AGRICULTURAL NEWS. 



July 20, 1912. 



The announcement is made that a new work entitled 

 Coco-nuts, The Consols of the East, will be ready shortly. 

 The authors of this are H. Hamel Smith, the editor of 

 Tropical Liu, and F. A. G. Pape, F.K.G.S. It is to deal 

 with the cultivation of coco-nuts and the utilization of the? 

 by-products of the plant, and will be fully illustrated. The 

 price of the work will be lis., post free. 



GLEANINGS. 



It is reported from Nevis that about 300 acres of cotton 

 ■were planted in the island during last month. Germination 

 bad been fair, but at the time of reporting the seedlings were 

 suffering much from drought. 



Information received from the Agricultural Superin- 

 tendent, St. Vincent, states that the sales of selected and 

 disinfected cotton seed to small growers, from the Central 

 Cotton Ginnery, for the present season, have amounted to 

 about 7,000 ft.. 



Tlie distribution from the St. Lucia Botanic Station 

 rluring the month of June included the following plants: 

 limes 5,600, cacao 300, budded oranges 6, grafted mangoes 

 4, nutmegs 56, ornamental plants 474. There were also 

 .^ent out 183 packets of seeds. 



Details supplied from the Dominica Botanic Station 

 show that the distribution from that Station during June 

 included the following plants: limes 6,025, cacao 300, grafted 

 cacao 30, budded grape fruit 20, grafted mangoes 6, miscel- 

 laneous 18. The total distribution for the month comprised 

 0,399 plants. 



In the E.i:perimeiit Station Record, Vol. XXVI, p. 559, 

 ■issued May 7, 1912, mention is made of an instance of para- 

 sitism of a mosquito by a midge. The midge, which is 

 a small Chironomid fly, was observed with its proboscis insert- 

 ed into a mosquito {Myzomyia rossii), from which it was 

 apparently sucking blood. 



A copy has been received of a new monthly publication 

 entitled Revue Econc/inique Internationale, which contains 

 several u.'^eful articles dealing in a general waj- with the 

 exploitation of plants, notably of those used in rubber pro- 

 duction. The office from which the journal is issued is situ- 

 nted at 4 Rue du Parlement, Brussels. 



We are asked to say that Lady Hooker will be grateful 

 if any of her friends who possess letters written by her late 

 husband, Sir Joseph Hooker, will lend them to her for the 

 purposes of a biography which Messrs. Smith, Elder <t Co.- 

 will publish. The letters, which should be forwarded to Lady 

 Hooker at The Camp, Sunningdale, will be carefully returned. 

 {Nature, 3 \xr.^ 13, 1912.) 



An estimate of the cotton crop of German East Africa, 

 contained in the BOrsen Zeitung (Berlin), of .May 3, gives 

 the cotton crop of German East Africa for the present .sea- 

 son as 5,000 bales (of 550 ft.), and that of Togoland as 

 2,500 bales: the value of this cotton will be about £150,000. 

 It is expected that the production will increase further in 

 1912-13, for the amount of seed that is being sown has almost 

 doubled. 



The President of the Board of Trade has appointed 

 Mr. C. Hamilton Wickes, at present His Majesty's Trade 

 Commissioner for Australia, to be His Majesty's Trade 

 Commissioner for Canada, in place of Mr. Richard Grigg, 

 who has resigned on acceptance of an important appointment 

 under the Dominion Government. Mr. Hamilton Wickes 

 will take up his duties in Canada early in the autumn of 

 this year. (The Board of Trade Journal, May 23, 1912.) 



According to the Annual Report of the Durban. 

 Chamber of Commerce for 1911, the Xatal sugar industry 

 made considerable progress during last year. The crop of 

 that year yielded 92,000 tons of sugar as compared with 

 82,000 tons in 1910, the increase being partly due to the 

 erection of improved machinery, and partly to the greater 

 acreage. The estimate is made that the crop of 1912 will 

 produce 112,000 tons: this will be sufficient to supply- 

 nearly all the needs of South Africa as far as sugar is 

 concerned. 



The Governmint Gazette of the territory of Papua for 

 May 1, 1912, signalizes the discovery of petroleum on the 

 Vailala River, in Papua, by a report by the Assistant 

 Government Geologist of Xew South Wales of an investi- 

 gation of the supposed indications of the occurrence of oil 

 that was made in the first months of this year. The original 

 discoveries which led to the prediction of the existence of oil 

 took place in September 1911. The same issue of the 

 Gazette contains a despatch regarding the procedure to be 

 adopted in regard to petroleum leases in Papua. 



Dealing with part of the Dutch West Indies, Diplomatic 

 and Considar Reports, No. 4879 Annual Series gives the 

 following information: 'The cultivation of cotton has beeu 

 favourably reported upon in the Island of St. Eustatius. 

 Complaints continue to come in regarding the bad conditions 

 prevailing in the harbour of Willemstad. The Budget pro- 

 vides for the enlargement on a small scale of the St. Annfe 

 Bay. Further measures were made dependent upon the 

 findings of a committee constituted to inquire into the 

 possible results which the opening of the Panama Canal 

 might have upon the Netherlands and her colonies.' 



