Nov. I, 1886.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



32j 



regular rainfall modifies the excessive temperature, and 

 renders the climate not disagreeable (for the tropics). 

 Chinese labour is chiefly reJied upon. Hitherto the 

 resemblance to Ceylou experience, of a temporary 

 extraodinary yield in the cases of coffee, cinchona and 

 spices, more particularly of the latter, only to be 

 followed by disease and disaster, has marked the 

 history of cultivation in the Straits, Malay Penin- 

 sular. It remains to be seen whether tea, as prophesied 

 en a qnatii scientific hypothesis, will follow the same 

 course. For my own part there is a noteworthy 

 difference between tea on the one hand and spices 

 and coffee on the other, if we exclude cinnamon and 

 roots. Thus tea is a leaf crop, the others for the 

 sake of argument are fruit crops. Nov/, it is an accepted 

 axiom that fruit is an effort of nature e.xerts her- 

 self in proportion to the danger which may be incurred 

 by the species. For this reason we expose the roots 

 of vines, peaches, &c., and produce temporary debility, 

 so to speak, and this excites nature to put forth her 

 utmost efforts to insure reproduction, which efforts 

 once excited we feed and nourish with rich and 

 suitable manures. In the case of the wonderful yield 

 of coffee obtained in Ceylon in the palmy days, we 

 may have had the best index that either the soil 

 or the climate was not suited for the p-rmanent 

 ^endurance of the plant, inasmuch as nature made 

 such extraordinary efforts towards reproduction, there- 

 by under the above axiom telling us that the healthy 

 appearance of the bushes was misleading, and that 

 their vitality was low, just as a powerful man to all 

 external appearance Kay have the seeds of death 

 maturing within him. Now, the yield of tea in 

 Ceylon bears on this line of reasoning no analogy 

 to the past experience, re coffee and spices. Where, 

 however, we may look for an index, if this mode 

 of reasoning has anything in it, is in the yield of 

 tea-seed per acre in Ceylon. It is not alone a matter 

 of curiosity, but of great importance— as establishing 

 a precedent for future guidance in respect of other 

 crops — that planters in Ceylon should at this early 

 stage compile statistics of the yield of tea-seed per 

 acre in various localities, which statistics should be 

 carefully filed by some record-office in Ceylon. These 

 statistics should in the first instance be compared 

 with the average yields of similar— ^;V/? — plants in 

 Assam, and cases of excessive yield carefully noted 

 and tabulated. Should a large excess be noted 

 perennially, then, under above axiom, that excess 

 should indicate the approach of disease, blight, &c., 

 and efforts should be made to stave off the evil day 

 by applying the particular manure which chemists 

 should be able to recommend after comparative analyses 

 of tea-soils and Ceylon soils. The vast difference in 

 the seed yield of different jaU in Assam is so re- 

 markable as to make the insistence of special care 

 •in comparing the statistics of the greatest importance. 

 The above axiom is borne out by these very dift'erencei 

 of seed-yield in Assam. Pure indigenous bushes under 

 cultivation and sickly old China bushes give the largest 

 yield. Healthy hybrids give the lowest seed yield. 

 The pure indigenous have not become habituated 

 by " heredity " to exposure and to pruning and plucking 

 and in fact to artificial living, and, " feeling," upset 

 so to speak, in fear of death, seek to reproduce 

 the species. The low, old Chinas found on some of 

 the oldest gardens, come from a worn out stock 

 deteriorated by centuries of artificial existence in 

 China, and being old plants too in themselves, without 

 a strain of the indigenous to reinvigorate their effete 

 race, also, spend their strength in efforts after re- 

 production. The healthy hybrids, being tiie result 

 of new life infused into stock already accustomed 

 to abuse and unnatural usage, embrace many of the 

 characteristics of mules ; and being vigorous and hardy, 

 under the conditions for which by descent on both 

 sides they have been produced, they make but little 

 effort to reproduce the species. This reasoning might 

 be fol'owed up in a sea^jch after the best crosses, 

 as I by no means wish it to be supposed that I am 

 h«re advocating a cross direct between a pure in- 

 digenous and a pure China. On the contrary, we 

 want thf smalUst possible amount of the deteiio.ated 



China race which will suffice to infuse the asinine 

 quality of long suffering under abuse and unnatural 

 treatment into the more desirable qualities of the 

 thorough-bred. Crosses are now so woefully mixed in 

 Assam, that few gardens a; e suited for using as true 

 test.s, but there are many which would serve for all 

 practical purposes. AVere Ceylon planters to send a 

 commission to those gardens from whence the seed 

 used in Ceylon had been sent, to report upon each, 

 with a view to comparing thej'at conditions, and sur- 

 rounding jats of the parent gardens with the progeny 

 as visible in Ceylon, it might save vast sums being 

 wasted in the future. The whole scope of the en- 

 quiry and comparison is too vast to enter into here, 

 but if a botanist, who had made a special study of 

 the laws of reproduction were to accompany the com- 

 mission, its usefulness would be increased. Take one 

 instance- An estate planted on shallow strong soil in 

 Ceylon might have a dangerously high record in seed 

 yield, yet the parent garden planted on deep, rich, 

 forest soil in Assam might be all that could be wished. 

 Its seed, however, would be totally unsuited for that 

 particular Cej'lon plantation. The way in which people 

 have gone in blind-fold and purchased their seed merely 

 becau.se it was the "best"— for its own conditions 

 — irrespective of all the teachings of science as to 

 "heredity" and the laws of reproduction is staggering. 

 Thej; would not attempt to breed their racers by 

 sending their Arab to a donkey to obtain produce 

 qualified for weight carrying, why should they be less 

 paiticular in a matter of vital consequence to the 

 success of their plantations ? — Indian Planters' Gn-ette. 



ARNOLD'S COFFEE MANUAT.. 



As much literature has lately grown up about the 

 cultivation of tea, we are glad to welcome a book .* 

 that is likely to recall public attention to the advant- 

 ages of the cultivation of coffee. ]\[any excellent 

 works on this .subject already exist, but they are, 

 in many cases, of a nature little calculated to attract 

 the notice of any one contemplating opening a coffee 

 estate in India, or to give him much useful inform- 

 ation as to what he may expect during his first few 

 years in this country. Some of these books are 

 antiquated; some, and, perhaps, the best refer exclu- 

 sively to Ceylou, where the conditions of life are 

 somewhat different to what they are in India ; while 

 others diverge into questions interesting enough in 

 themselves, but which have little to do with the 

 matter in hand. Now Jlr. Arnold's book gives a 

 very fair idea of the work that has to be done in 

 opening and managing an estate, and of the planter's 

 life and surroundings. It does not make the mistake 

 of representing the life in too enticing colours, but 

 neither does it fail to show that the pursuit has many 

 attractions for those who are suited for it. Keaders 

 of the author's former work will remember that his 

 experience was principally gained as one of the 

 first Europeans in the Neillampathy Hills, where the 

 life was then about the roughest, and the difliculties 

 of all kinds the greatest, that coffee planters have 

 had to contend with in these latter days. His account 

 of a beginner's troubles and of some items of expend- 

 iture must therefore be taken with a certain amount 

 of qualification ; but his book will be found eminently 

 readable. It contains a great deal of useful inform- 

 ation, and though some of his opinions are open to 

 controversy, they are never put forward with the 

 aggravating air of superiority found in some writers 

 on kindred subjects. 



Mr. Arnold commences with the ine\atable historical 

 retrospect, and briefly traces the history of the plant 

 from its origin il home in Abyssinia, whence it appears 

 to have been first introduced to .A.rabia in the I-4th 

 century. An enterprising Bishop attempted to grew 

 it in England about 1796, and the Dutch have a 

 tradition that all their Eastern plant ati9n^ are from 

 seed grown in Holland. The first planting in India 



'"' Coffee: Ita Ctdlivaduii and Profit By E- L. Arn'^kl 

 on don, AYhittiugham & Co., 1886, 



