Oct. I, jS86;] 



THg TROPICAL AORXCaLTURISl^ 



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size. It would be well for those who inteud cultiv- 

 ating the Coconut in Jamaica if they were to seek 

 a supply of this special kind, as without any doubt it 

 is very much more valuable than the common variety, 

 and would coniniaud a much higher price in any 

 market. 



A destructive auimal in the provision grounds is 

 the sloth, which is fairly numerous. It is a disgusting 

 looking creature, and specially adapted in form for 

 living in the branches of trees, &c. It is to be seen 

 occasionallj' at mid-day perched upon the top of a 

 buuch of Bananas or Plantains, leisurely eating 

 them without any apparent regard to e.\;terual 

 objects, never leaving the bunch until it is entirely 

 consumed. 



riue-apples of the several commoner kinds are in 

 cultivation on the provision grounds; but just as we 

 were leaving we were presented with two enormous 

 fruits of a superior variety. I immediately recognised 

 this as being the true Smooth Cayenne, a variety 

 which I have not as yet seen in Jamaica. Inquiring 

 into the history of its introduction into the i.slands, 

 we were tol<l that the plants were introduced from 

 Jamaica. It is one of the best varieties that can 

 be grown, and is highly esteemed, even when produced 

 under artificial cu)tivatioir in English hothouses. 

 I cannot t.ike leave of this district without mention- 

 ing the immense tract of land on the interior mouu- 

 tiiins, which without a doubt possess a climate some- 

 what simUar to the Jamaica hills. Hence it follows 

 that there is plenty of room for the cultivation of 

 such products as Cinchona, Coffee, Tea, kc, while 

 the coast districts are suitable for the growth of 

 nearly all tropical products, &c. Cacao is at home 

 in the tracls near the coast, and produces much finer 

 beans naturally than can be exhibited by many other 

 countries which expend a large amount of capital and 

 labour iu its production. — J. Haht, Jamaica. — 

 Gardener s" Chronicle. 



INDIAN AND CEYLON TEA AND COFFEE, 



AND THE TEBEIBLE ADULTEBATION OF 



THE LATTER. 



[A mercantile correspondent in expressing the wish 

 that the following article should be republished, says 

 that Mes.srs. Gladstone and Bright are largely respon- 

 sible for the adulteration of coffee as sold to the 

 J']nglish working classes, but so, in fact, are all 

 M. r.'s who are silent under the present iniquitous 

 system of allowing mixtures of coffee and foreign 

 substances t" he sold. — Ed] 



Nature has prepared, in Ceylon and Southern India, 

 a special home for the plants from the leaves of one 

 of which and from the seeds, of the other come an 

 average Briton's mornin?- and evening draught. China 

 may be proud of her Pekoe and may set aside her 

 choicest Bohra for the cultivated throats of Mand- 

 arins, but events seem to hint that it is no longer 

 her destiny to fill the breakfast urns of " foreign 

 devils" with those sun-dried leaves that have for so 

 long formed her staple trade. In Assam, to the 

 Soutli, and farther down yet in Hindustan, where 

 the black Deccan soil dips away iu noble terraces, 

 to the teeming plains of the Madras lowlands, there 

 are districts where the tea shrub can be, and is, 

 as well and successfully cultivated as it ever was 

 beside the ciuals and willow trees of the Celestial 

 kingdom, Ceylon, again, a little thrown bask by her 

 short coffee crops, now finds she can grow good tea, 

 and, what is equally important, can dry and cure it 

 to suit the curious and difficult tastes of Europe. 

 The industry is rising rapidly within the limits of 

 that brightest jewel of the English Crown, and the 

 island hillside.", where the disease-swept miles of coffee 

 bushes stood a year or two ago, have now put on a 

 new livery of venlure and in-osperity, and the "flush" 

 of new leaves which marks the commencement of each 

 season finds a counterpart, we must hope, in the 

 cash-account of Englishmen who have been down to 

 the very bottom of the well of despondency till this 

 uew enterprise rescued them. 



This Ceylon tea is not a mere fancy article. _ It is 

 good sterling "stuff," commanding a high price in 

 the open market, of recognized strength, cured with 

 the best knowledge of modern times — as regards the 

 best samples, at least — packed judiciously in well- 

 chosen wood, and to be had for the asking in a 

 steady and constant stream. Only two things are 

 necessary to exalt Indian tea to the pinnacle of good 

 repute and fasMon — the stern suppression of adulter- 

 ation in every form and an encouraging initiative 

 patronage by all those who wish well to Briti.sh trade 

 and enterprize. "While dark arts are in certain quarters 

 practiced to a lamentable extent ia disguising and 

 weighting teas, coft'ee suffers even more from thi.s 

 cause than the alternate drink. It is an open secret 

 that consumers at home very rarely obtain a genuinely 

 good cup of coffee untampered with and prepared as 

 it should be. Here, in these stalls at South Kensington, 

 may be ."^een the bean in its natural state, just as it 

 conies down Indian Ghauts on the backs of a long 

 file of white bullocks, when the " pulp " and " parch- 

 ment " that composed the cherry-like fruit have been 

 crushed and washed off. .\gain, we see it here roasted 

 as it should be and ground finely, an operation that 

 should not take place until just before the coffee is 

 needed, as if kexit roasted and pulverized long, mvich 

 of the delicate strength and pungency is lost. When 

 visitors have had a hasty and superficial education in 

 the variety of beans from Mysore, Coorg, the AN'yuaad, 

 the Neilgherries, Travaucore, or whatever territorial 

 designation the sample may bear, they may put their 

 ideas of goodness to a practical test by stepping down 

 to the neighbouring coffee-stalls and sipping there with 

 judicial acumen a genuine cup of coffef, such as that 

 with which Fatima solaced the thoughtful moods of 

 the Prophet, and which to-day serves Afghan and 

 Arab, Nubiv. and Turk, for meat and drink combined. 

 Coffee is an invigorator for work and a restorative for 

 strained nerves and faculties. It must be owned that 

 the sovereign good qualities of this coffee, grown under 

 the .shadow of the British flag, may not strike every one 

 as a happy revelation. English taste is vitiated by long 

 abuse. People have drunk noxious compounds so 

 long that they hug their delusions and hardly 

 recognize anything but a foreign smack in the 

 genuine article when the allied planters and th 3 Ex- 

 hibition thrust it under their unappreciative noses. 

 In the United Kingdom its consumption hitherto, 

 unfortuuatelj', has bi'en hindered to a great extent 

 by many and shameful adulterations, ca.rried to .such 

 lengths that large classes of the population hardly 

 know the flavour of genuine coffee. Chicory is the 

 chief ingredient in the cheap mi.xtures, because it 

 soon makes hot water black, thick, and bitter, and 

 so gives apparent strength to what may contain 

 little of the coft'ce-berry. Among many other sub- 

 stances used to adulterate coffee are burnt sugar, 

 roasted and ground roots of dandelion, carrot, and 

 parsnip, together with beans, lupin and other seeds. 

 These are mixed in varying proportions, the only 

 " vegetable matter consistently in the minority " being 

 the substance that gives a nom de (/verve to the 

 miserable preparation. An analysis of forty-three 

 simples of coffee and coffee mixtures purchased in 

 London during March and April, 1S86, shows an 

 average proportion of coffee in these samples of 

 just fifty per cent., added to fifty per cent of burnt 

 sugar and various vegetable substances. Nine of those 

 samples contain from 62 to 93 per cent of chicory, 

 &c., averpging 70 per cent of other substances than 

 coft'ee. Those mixtures are sold at prices ranging 

 from lOd up to Is 4d per lb. The price of the pure 

 Indian coffee sold in packets at the IJoyal Commis- 

 sion's stalls is Is 4d per lb. Upon a moderate cal- 

 culation the vendors of many of the compoimds just 

 mentioned must be realizing profits of somotliing like 

 IDO per cent., and the worse the mixture the greater 

 the gain ; but from the report of the Local Govern= 

 ment Board for 1884-5 on this subject we nny call 

 a story which shows adulteration in cxcelsi^. Coffee, 

 says the evidence, continuc.s to be one of the chief 

 subjects tampered with, aud about one-fifth of the 

 gfiraplee examinod were cwidemaed, " Tbe peculiarity 



