AVG. 2, 1886.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST- 



00 



nevertheless he has hit upon a plan which he 

 hopes will do well for him in every way. With 

 a zeal for fair dealing, he has rei^iuested that a 

 sample from each bag should be sent so as to put 

 a check on anything like mixing, and if can carry 

 that point, he will have all his anxiety altogether 

 removed regarding his bungalow rice supply ! 



The ravages of the grass-hopper on tea planted 

 at stake is often so worrying, as to make the planter 

 almost regret at times, having gone in for tea. How 

 to prevent the insect from carrying on its de- 

 structive work is however the difficulty, and yet 

 when you see the tender shoot laid over, you feel 

 savage enough and would gladly try something to 

 save others from similar misfortune. I understand 

 that this hard problem how to checkmate the 

 hopper, has been solved by the simple plan of 

 getting together a lot of village fowls and herding 

 them over the field, in which the tea seed has 

 been planted. The fowls take kindly to the grass- 

 hopper, and very soon reduce their numbers. 



In America it is a common enough thing for 

 a man to go in for " a hen ranch." I knew a 

 a Ceylon planter who tried it, and did not make 

 a fortune by it ; but then he depended on his 

 fowls alone. A hen ranch on a tea garden would 

 be altogether different, for besides their use in 

 clearing the land of grass-hoppers, the birds might 

 be supposed to f atte n for the table, and thus more 

 than cover the outlay connected with their upkeep. 



In these days when the tea planter is being 

 preached to on all hands regarding the necessity 

 of keeping up the quality of his teas, I fancy 

 that we will have to recognize the fact that soil, 

 elevation, and plants are factors which the skilled 

 manipulator has to take into account. Cite 

 of the most successful tea-makers in the island, 

 when visiting a friend lately, offered to take charge 

 of the three days' :- viking, .md promised to turn 

 out a sample of tea which would equal his own. 

 He did his best to bring about this result, but 

 failed. Although he somewhat improved the quality, 

 still it was a long way from that which ha> 

 raised his name and that of his estate into the 

 first rank. How was this '? Had the soil, elevation, 

 or kind of plant anything to do with it ? What- 

 ever was the reason, there was the hard fact that 

 a man who can regularly turn out teas of the 

 first grade while on his own estate, yet failed to 

 do it with leaf grown at a different elevation and 

 on different soil. Pkppercorn, 



OVEEPEODUCTION OF TEA. 



The June number of the Revue Coloniale Inter- 

 nationale contains articles of interest in French, 

 German and English. Amongst the latter we find 

 an article entitled " Overproduction and Tea Culture" 

 by E. A. K., translated from De Indische Mer- 

 ciiur. It commences as follows : — 



Ask whom you will ; ask the whole world round, 

 where, at present, is there any prospect of earniug 

 something H "Where does business flourish ? What 

 persons, what trading-houses can candidly declare that 

 they are progressing in prosperity ? — There are but very 

 few and those solitary cases, that can be pointed at who 

 can say so. If there are — as regards Netherlands and 

 the Netherlanders — a few banks and money establish- 

 ments, at Deli and Eilliton, a couple of railway com- 

 panies and newspaper undertakings, almost all is said. 



The history of former ages shows periods of general 

 depression and of dearth and famine ; but if you in- 

 vestigate the causes, these will be found to be war, per- 

 secution for the faith, plague, floods or similar calam- 

 ities interfering with the regular production, and thus 

 putting a stop to all trade for want of available com- 

 mercial wares, or el.se for lack of sufficient security to 

 persons and goods. Whereas non' that depression pre- 



vails everywhere, and though there is no questiiu of a 

 general famine as used to rage in times of yore, yet 

 when a number of individuals and families are really 

 starving, noa^ the case is just the reverse: not the 

 stoppage of productiveness, but over-production ; not a 

 lack of available commercial wares, but accumulation 

 of stock and excess of supply; not the absence of se- 

 curity for persons and goods, but (save very local and 

 transient exceptions) order and peace everywhere, ac- 

 celerated expedition of merchandise, and rapid and con- 

 venient locomotioH for the traveller. 



Where then lies the fault i* Have fields, gardens, 

 pastures aud woods become less productive ? Does 

 the miner dig less treasure from the ground H Do 

 the fishermen's nets and hooks capture less prey y 

 Have the means of communication bj' land or water 

 become more imperfect or expensive ? Is there any 

 lack of intelligence to render the work efficient 

 and economical, in short, to make it productive ? 

 Is there a paucity of labouring bauds r* By no meaus. 

 Science has extended her benign power over all 

 human transactions. Botany, Zoology, Chemistry and 

 Mechanics have exerted their beneficial influence on 

 agriculture and cattle-breeding ; gardening and for- 

 estry are attended to with greater care and consider- 

 ation than formerly ; mineralogy aud metallurgy in- 

 struct the miner ; chemistry, electro-magnetism and all 

 kinds of scientifically improved instruments and ap- 

 pliances everywhere facifitate the labours of the manu- 

 facturer, the mariner, the fisherman, the architect ; 

 and now, where force falls short — where the human 

 hand, the ox and the horse, the windmill and the water- 

 wheel, which formerly were all in all, prove insufficient, 

 steam steps forth in a thousand ways, and furnishes 

 force to any amount. 



Then to what or to whom is the fault to be at- 

 tributed ? Man alone is in fault himself. His extra'^agant 

 desires aud his want of sense are the fault of all this. 

 We are — and with cause — proud of the scientific at- 

 tainments of the 19th centurj', but, alas ! we overlook 

 the fact, that commonsense is often lamentably in 

 the rear. Merchants, ship-owners, railway-kings and 

 statesmen, who have mayhap often chuckled at the 

 story of the six gates of Abdera as a skit on the .silly 

 application of the rule of three, apply that very rule 

 to enterprises, to which the six gates of Abdera might 

 ))0 rightly termed mere child's play. The greatest, and 

 in its consequences the most ruinous, afi'air of this 

 kind, of which recent times have offered us the painful 

 and striking spectacle, were the railway speculations 

 in America. 



Details of railway speculation in the United Sates 

 are then given. The conglusion is : — 



The cupidity of the would-be millionaires has levelled 

 a severe blow to the prosperity both of America and 

 Europe ; and nobody is able for the present to com- 

 pute how much time it will take ere commerce, agri - 

 culture and trade ■will emerge from this pool of over- 

 production, in which they are all in danger of being 

 submerged. This one e.xample of Ah Jeritism will suffice 

 for my present purpose, though innumerable instances 

 might be produced in other departments. 



And then the writer goes on to deal with our 

 Ceylon tea enterprise, thus :— 



Let us hope that good sense has been purchased in 

 proportion to the enormous penalty V It is not only a sad, 

 but also a grievous spectacle, surrouuded as we are by so 

 many examples of misery resulting from over-pro- 

 duction, still to see persons, who not only refrain 

 from warning against it, but who do all their b' sfc 

 to increase the evil with all their power ; who summon 

 up " all hands " to give even a greater expansion to 

 this existing over-production. What precedes re- 

 flects near about the course of my ideas while read- 

 mg a pamphlet published the other day. entitled : 

 The Cei/loii I'cn L/dustr;/, an opcnhuj for men of moder- 

 ate Oaintal. By John Hamilton (late of Ceylon). 

 To those who take an interest in Colonial agri- 

 culture, the vicissitudes of culture in Ceylon 

 are generally known, and so I need not here en- 

 large upon the incidents in that Island with respect 

 to coffee aud cinchona. With truly admirable energy 

 did the capitalists and plauterfi of Ceylon, when coffee 



