OfiC, if 1886.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



38s 



A Russi.wj Plan to extract rusty screws is to 

 heat a flat iron bar to a cherry red and press it 

 in the head of the screw for a couple of minutes, 

 after which the screw becomes loosened, and is 

 easily extracted with a screw driver. — Xilijiri 

 Ex})ress. 



Cinchona Plantations. — At the request of Mr. M. A 

 Lawson, Government Botanist and Director of Cinchona 

 Plantations, Government have sanctioned the abandon- 

 ment of the Kalhatti Cinchona Gardens on the Nilgirris 

 from the commencement of the next official year. The 

 Collector has been instructed to dispose of the site 

 in the manner most advantageous to Government. — 

 Madras Standard. 



Perfect Insulators. — Some experiments lately 

 brought before the Paris Academy by M. Luvini, 

 combine with those of other observers (he considers) 

 in warranting the conclusion that "gases and 

 vapours, under any pressure, and at all temper- 

 atures, are perfect insulators, and cannot be electri- 

 fied through friction, either with one another, or 

 with solid or liquid substances." — Nature. 



Young Baboon. — Mr. H. H. Johnston informs 

 us, (The KiUma-Njaro Expedition), that when in 

 East Africa, he shot a baboon, young and tender, 

 which he had cooked and ate. " I can only say 

 that the succulence and quality of this creature's 

 flesh were quite unexceptionable." He writes of 

 having met elephants at the elevation of 13,000 

 feet, says they mount banks with the agility of 

 goats, and is convinced that the elephant " can 

 easily adapt himself to a mountain life." — Nibjiri 

 Express. 



Coffee Rolls. — Take twelve cups of flour, one of 

 white sugar, one half of butter or lard, one of yeast, 

 one grated nutmej^, aud three eggs. Mix with three 

 large cups of warm milk, and let it rise over night ; 

 if well risen in the morning, knead aud set in a cool 

 place until three o'clock in the afternoon, then shape 

 into long rolls, and let them rise one hour and 

 a half. Bake half an hour in a moderate oven. 

 When done, glaze them with a little milk in which 

 a little brown sugar has been dissolved and set them 

 back in the oven for two minutes. — Appledore Cook Book. 



Nat.al Tea. — Our Tea Correspondent, the " Peri- 

 patetic Planter" was kind enough to send us two 

 samples of Natal tea, which our Managing Agents, 

 Messrs. Balmer Lawrie & Co., were good enough to 

 have sampled and priced for us by a tea 

 expert with the following result: — "Natal Tea. 

 — The two samples of Natal tea, leafy broken 

 Pekoe Souchong and rather open leaf Broken 

 Pekoe, are not unlike Indian or Ceylon tea in 

 appearance ; in liquor they are softer, more like the 

 China manufacture. I should describe the liquor as 

 rather dark soft not strong ; they want the strength 

 and pungency of Assam teas, the outturn is dark, 

 the quality generally not good : value in Calcutta 

 today 6-3 annas broken Pekoe Souchong, 8 annas 

 Broken Pekoe. — Indian Planters Gazette. 



Fluid ExTRAcfr of Cinchona. — At the request of 

 the Surgeon-General, her Majesty's Forces, Govern- 

 ment have ordered a certain quantity of the new 

 preparation of cinchona — the fluid extract by Mr. 

 Hooper, the Government Quinologist— to be placed 

 at his disposal, for trial in Upper Burmah, as there 

 appears to bs a large amount of inefficiency caused 

 by fever in that country. To give publicity to the 

 preparation, Government have approved of the sug- 

 gestion of Dr. Bidie, to issue the drug gratuitously 

 to certain charitable dispensaries, both for experi- 

 mental trial in hospitals and for issue, free of charge, 

 to outdoor sick in quantities not exceeding one ounce. 

 This gratuitous issue is to be continued for one 

 year, subject to a report at the end of that period. 

 •—South India Observer. 



North Borneo, Oct. 7th. — His Excellency the 

 Governor arrived from Sandakan, in the steam 

 launch " Kimanis " on the evening of 31st August, 

 on a visit to the West Coast Stations. The fol- 

 lowing day the Governor, accompanied by the 

 Resident, rode to the Hakka Settlement. The 

 gardens were looking fairly well but the men 

 appeared to be planting up more land than they 

 could look after properly. The Liberian coffee, 

 tea, pepper, &c., were all growing luxuriantly. A 

 visit was next paid to Limau Limawan, a smt<ll 

 island lying five miles south of Kudat, and leased 

 to the Imaum, Hadji Abdul Drahim, who first 

 opened a settlement there towards the end of 1883. 

 His village now contains a prosperous community 

 of about three hundred souls. On September 3rd 

 the Governor, the Resident, and Mr. Christian 

 proceeded to the German Borneo Company's Es- 

 tate at Limbuac, Banguey Island. His Excellency 

 was much pleased with all he saw, and the party 

 walked to Mitford covering the distance of a 

 little over seven miles in a couple of hours. 

 The road was found to be rather rough in some 

 places. On the way to Kudat, in the launch the S. S. 

 "Hong Ann" from Labuan was sighted off Muliangin, 

 and Capt. Slaker kindly stopped her and delivered 

 the mails. Owing to news received the Governor 

 after a short stay in Kukad returned to Sanda- 

 kan. Mr. Christian, a Ceylon planter, is opening 

 an estate for Liberian coffee, cocoa, &c., three 

 miles from Kudat on the road to the Hakka 

 Settlement. The late Mr. T. Parry, examined 

 this land at the request of the Resident, and 

 thought there were five hundred acres of as good 

 soil as that found on the Pangkalan River 

 Banguey. — British Nortit Borneo Herald. 



Noxious Weeds. — On Tuesday evening the assembled 

 wisdom of the colony collectively shirked the task of 

 defining what is aud what is nob a noxious weed. 

 Probably our legislators considered that the powers of 

 Parliament are already sufficiently large without adding 

 to them the function of making botanical classifications. 

 But, impressed as they evidently were with the im- 

 portance of constructing a correci; definition, it was too 

 bad of them to hand that duty over to the divisional 

 boards. There is no saying what may be the con- 

 sequences to posterity — who are our favourite clients 

 nowadays — of armiug these unscientific bodies with 

 power to exterminate from the face of the land what- 

 ever they may choose to place under the category 

 of weeds. Even if they should go no farther than sida 

 retusa, prickly pears, and thistles, one may be pardoned 

 for contemplating with somewhat of fear the extirpation 

 of these fecund and hardy races. The secrets of 

 Nature are nothing like half-explored yet, and who 

 "knows what potentialities of textile fabric may perish 

 with sida retusa, what famine-defying ensilage with 

 the prickly pear, what fortifying elixir with the thistle y 

 What will posterity say if the virtues of these races, 

 here exterminated, should be discovered in some other 

 country, and the Government of the future be com- 

 pelled to import them, like the American seed maize, 

 and distribute them at so much a root? As the ex- 

 tirpation of these "noxious weeds," provisionally so- 

 called, will cost a deal of money, it really becomes an 

 important question whether it would not be as well 

 to set aside a fair share of it as rewards for the 

 successful interrogation of Nature as to what she had 

 in her eye when she created them. Failing this — for 

 the endowment of research is not likely to commend 

 itself to the divisional board mind — by all means let 

 us, in the interest of posterity, have siJa retusa reserves, 

 prickly pear reserves, thistle reserves ; and, if even this 

 simple suggestion should fail to find acceptance, we 

 call upon all whose hearts yearn over their uubegotten 

 descendants to put away privily a root or two of each 

 of those doomed vegetables, where the divisional eye 

 canuot see them, as centres of future propagation. 

 There will be no difficulty about it. In fact, it ought 

 to be quite au easy matter to elude the notice of 

 such ihort-sighted legiAsktion.—Queenslander. 



