Sept. i, 1886.] 



ME TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST, 



fii 



i6g 



MULBEKRY BARK AND COCA SEED. 



I 



London, 15th Jn^y ISSO. 



Deau Sir., — Paper Miilbernj Jiark. — I have this 

 here now havhig bought at auction and can get 

 hardly anything for it. I only paid a few Khillingf 

 for the whole lot. I knew it was valuable but fibre 

 is so plentiful no one cares to work at new things, I 

 so they go as "waste." ; 



Coca Seed. — It is very difficult to grow ; if a seed [ 

 is opened carefully, the green leaf may be seen in- 

 side and yet it won't grow. I have three parcels here ! 

 now brought home by collectors of seeds and I was I 

 asked one shilling per seed ; as I desired proof of 

 the seed being alive, a sample was given me but 

 none germinated.— Yours faithfully, T. CHRISTY. 



[We have been favored \\ith practical instruc- 

 tions for coca planters received from South America 

 which will appear shortly. — Ed.] 



ME. IRVINE AGAIN WRITES ON UVA TEA. 



Madulsima, 28th July 188(5. 

 Dkar Sin, — I have from time to time written a 

 good deal on Uva and its prospects as a tea-growing 

 di'^trict, and my statements have frequently been 

 called in f^uestion by my friends, sometimes as a 

 mere difference of opinion, and frequently on the 

 ground that the district was untried, and that I had 

 been many months absent from it, whilst tea was 

 being planted, also that from my long connection 

 with the district I was prejudiced in favor of it, 

 and that I wished by writing up tea, to advocate 

 the extension of the railway to ISadulla town. 

 I will admit that there may have been a small 

 modicum of truth in these statements, but I must 

 utterly deny ever having made a wilful misstatement 

 or stated anything which I did not implicitly believe 

 r.f.yself. My knowledge of tea in Uva dates months 

 farther back than most people suppose, for on 

 Kottagodde estate I cultivated for several years a small 

 piece of tea planted by Mr. Bcrtlin from the same 

 China seed introduced by Mr. Worms on Rothschild 

 estate. No tea was ever made, but the tea 

 was cultivated and regularly pruned and flushed 

 freely. On Pedro estate, which has both the Uva 

 climate and soil, Hybrid Assam tea introduced by 

 Capt. Bayley has been growing and flushing freely 

 for the last 12 years at an elevation of, say, (i,.500 

 feet ; besides these there were many isolated patches 

 of tea in I'va, all of which grew freely ; but my 

 statement that Uva would produce not only the 

 largest yield per acre but probably the finest tea 

 grown in the island, was a bold assertion to make 

 but 1 hoi)c soon to see il fulhllcd. This statement 

 was based on my knowledge of the soil and climate 

 of the various districts comprising the province of 

 Uva and on the condition and appearance of the 

 tea I had seen growing, as compared with tea in 

 other districts. There are few extremes of heat and 

 cold and the range of the thermometer at any 

 given elevation is less than in most hill districts ; 

 the climate is one of continual or a!ter;iatc sun- j 

 shine and showers, seldom any long-continued I 

 drought and rarely any long continuance i 

 of heavy monsoon rains or blustering winds. The \ 

 tea plant has here found a home more congenial ' 

 than its native habitat in Northern India and it 

 may be fairly assumed that tea grown under such 

 favourable condititns will produce the finest pro- 

 duct of the shrub. As for ray advocating railway 

 extension by writing up Uva tea, the (luestion is "a 

 tery simple one ; either my statements have been 

 altogether wrong and exaggerated, or it will take 

 ho great array of figures to show that more trans- 

 port accommodation will be recfuired up and down 

 to carry our tea than ever it did to carry our coil'ee. 



I have been some weeks in this district and have 

 seen a large acreage of tea, though 1 have not been 

 in Haputale yet ; anu ):aving devoted the greater 

 portion of my time to the tea cultivation of the 

 district, and having also sampled the teas just 

 beginning to bo made, I consider myself in a pos- 

 ition to have formed not a fancied but a just and 

 real opinion as to the capabilities of Uva as a tea- 

 producing district. The oldest cultivated te.-i in 

 Madulsima is on Galoola. The field is a small one, 

 two and a half years old, planted at slope. I have 

 seen no liner tea in the island. Younger tea of 

 various ages is equally good. On Uva estate tea 18 

 months old and cut down to the quick has grown 

 and is Hushing splendidly even during what is our 

 dry season. The capability or rather the capacity of 

 Uva tea for Hushing has been a much debated 

 question, but anyone who has seen the flush now 

 coming on will have no further doubt on this i)oint. 

 Tea will Hush perfectly, and I would place the yield 

 of Galoola under proper treatHient at BOO lbs made 

 tea per acre. The Uva estate tea promises quite as 

 well as to the strength and quality of the samples 

 or experimental small lots of tea manufactured, they 

 have mostly proved satisfactory. In the course of a 

 few weeks the Galoola factory will be at work as 

 well as several smaller or temporary factories, and 

 before 188(1 has come to a close Uva tea, I fear 

 not, will have proved for itself the superiority I 

 have always claimed for it. I have now written 

 eiiough on what my friends are pleased to call my 

 latest hobby ; let someone else take up the pen. 



JAMES IRVINE. 

 [We hope that Mr. Irvine's rather sanguine 

 expectations may prove correct and that the Uva 

 superintendents and planters will each and all do their 

 duty and prove themselves well forward in the 

 race among champion tea makers, for there is as much 

 in the manufacture as in soil or climtae. — Ed.] 



DURIAN FRUITS GROWN IN CEYLON. 



31st July 188(). 



Di:.ui Siii, — About twenty years ago I read an ac- 

 count in the Cci/Ioii Observer, from the pen of 

 " Josias Scadder," of some Durian trees which 

 produced fruit on an estate in Nilambe, and 

 shortly afterwards some one sent me a section of 

 the prickly rind of a fruit grown at Galle, where 

 there are a few trees which I believe bear fruits 

 regularly, and about August 1881 I pointed out to 

 Dr. Trimen the first fruits produced on the old 

 tree in the Royal Gardens, Peradeniya, in the fork 

 of the main drive and the road leading to the old 

 residence occupied by the late Dr. Thwaites. 

 Herephed : "Yes, but come and see a tree near the 

 entrance to the Gardens," and sure there it was so 

 loaded with prickly globular fruits about the size 

 of the small jak fruit, called Kuda Heraliya that 

 all the branches had to be supported with props 

 to prevoni, them fi'om breaking. It is a great pity 

 that Mr. Scowen did not take a photograph of this 

 tree at that time. 



A week ago I received a prickly fruit from the 

 Government Agent, Gallc, which I put on a table 

 in the dining-room, and at once an odour some- 

 what different from " the spicy brcer.es which blow 

 soft o'er Ceylon's Isle " began to pervade the house, 

 and the Durian fruit which left no doubt of its 

 identity was ordered out to the bath-room 1 Next 

 day I broke up the fruit, and though it appeared 

 to have been pulled before it was ripe, the puip 

 surrounding the seeds agreed with the graphic de- 

 scription given of it by Wallace, but the odour 

 from it was so strong that it was again ordered 

 OLit to the bath-room and the door shut on it. 1 

 took a section of it into the Ob^-crvcr Office for 



