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THE TROPI'CAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[FSB. I, 1887. 



perienced in the American homes of the fever 

 plants (fever-curing, rather,) had been chosen by Mr. 

 Clements Markham, for the introduction and cultiv- 

 ation of the cinchona trees in Ceylon. There we 

 found poor, thin, delicate MacNicol liard at work 

 propagating the precious plants by bedded cuttings, 

 the commencement of a process which covered the 

 mountains of Ceylon with more millions of C. Sued- 

 rubra and C. Officinalis, and hybrids between the 

 two and between them and the Calisayas than ever 

 existed in the native habitat of the plants amidst 

 the forests of the Andes,— the ultimate results being 

 the swamping of the bark market and the cheapen- 

 ing of the most valuable febribuge and _ tonic in 

 the vegetable kingdom, so as to place it within 

 reach of the millions of poor and suffering human 

 beings. The work which MacNicol began, was 

 well°and efficiently carried on by Edward Thwaites, 

 v.hose title to be remembered in connection with 

 Hakgala is mainly connected with the work, remuner- 

 ative to the Government and profitable to the country 

 to which he was compelled to devote most of his time 

 and of the money placed at liis disposal. Even 

 in his time, with what he was enabled to do under 

 the direction of his accomplished brother, in in- 

 troducing rare trees, flowers and fruits, Hakgala 

 was an attractive resort to residents at and visitors 

 to the neighbouring sanitarium. But to compare 

 the Gardens of even a few years ago, to what 

 Mr. Nock has now made them, (the changes 

 and improvements in even in the past six months 

 being wonderful,) would be to compare an ordin- 

 ary garden plot to Paradise. The 14th of Jan. 

 1887, the day on which we staitsd from 

 Upper Dimbula, for our re-visit, was un- 

 mistakeably a rainy day. We met the rain 

 and the cold wind which had accompa- 

 nied it down the gorges from Nuwara Eliya 

 soon after we commenced the magniricent ascent 

 of Longden Boad, but neither on our upward jour- 

 ney, in skiiting the Lake, which is beautiful 

 even in its shorn proportions out of regard for 

 the race course, nor in the steep descent from 

 '•Baker's Farm" to Hakgala, did the ueather 

 prevent us from enjoying and admiring the beau- 

 lifal mountam woodland, dressed in the tints of 

 spring. Those tints, which by March will have 

 passed into brilliant reds and crimsons, now pre- 

 sent a soft, lovely plum colour, which contrasts 

 exquisitely with the light green of the Jfi- 

 chaelias and the orange and copper colours of 

 individual trees, the blossoming iiiln still 

 brightening the jungle undergrowth. iSoon after 

 leaving the top of the pass near Baker's 

 Earm we could not help wondering why fire, as it 

 api.eared to us, had been applied to the ferns, the 

 balsams, the " Cahfornian daisies" and other 

 way-side plants, but we were more especially con- 

 cerned at the blackened and apparently dead ap- 

 pearance of the cinchona plants on the edge of a fine 

 plot about a mile below Nuwara Eliya. Tea at a 

 higher elevation showed no sign of having suffered 

 from the frost which was the real agency that had 

 applied " decay's effacing fingers." Later in the 

 day we noticed, that while cinchonas amidst coffee 

 had portions of their foliage blackened, (this was 

 a full mile below Hakgala, with an elevatisn of 

 probably 4,700 feet,) the .sheltered coffee under- 

 neath had escaped. It is cold, tearing wind 

 and not frost, from which coffee suffers, as 

 we had fresh opportunity of noticing in the Amba- 

 wela Valley, where the contrast between cul- 

 tivation in places sheltered from the cold, fierce 

 winds which swept over Ceylon in December, and 

 tha,t in exposed positions was most striking. There 

 Can be no question that while celd wind undoubtedly 

 4 ffects tea, especially when the plants are putting 



forth their tender flush after pruning, yet the power 

 of the full grown, vigorous tea plant, to resist cold 

 winds and even frost (the latter practically un- 

 known on the western side of the Nuwara Eliya 

 range) is far superior to that of coffee and cin- 

 chonas. En route to New Galway we could not 

 resist the tein]5tation of turning in to have 

 a look at Mr. Nock's revolutionary dealings 

 with the Hakgala Gardens, and our exclam- 

 ations of admiration and delight were loud 

 and frequent as we found ourselves api^roacbing 

 the bungalow by a new drive, the raised embank- 

 ments of which were beautifully turfed. A second 

 lakelet has also been added to reflect ferns and 

 other plants, as well as the stupendous precipice 

 of the mountain face. We had scarcely got into the 

 shelter of Mr. Nock's hospitable bungalow, rendered 

 cheerful by the presence of children as fresh and 

 healthy looking as their parents, when down came 

 a regular rainstorm, lasting nearly an hour. 

 We kept hoping that at least the ghost of the 

 rainfall had crossed the range to Dimbula 

 and our hopes were not disappointed, as 

 we found on our return. During our enforced 

 but pleasant stay, we learned from Mr. Nock that 

 his experience leads him to look for at least ten 

 rainy days after Christinas. As a rule it is not 

 an over-plus, but a paucity of rain which is the 

 trouble at Hakgala with its genial Uva climate, 

 and the multiplication of little lakelets in the 

 Gardens is desirable, not only on lesthetic principles, 

 but for the storage of water. As soon as the 

 rain had abated, we spent another delightful 

 hour un(,iej.' Mr. Nock's guidance, examining hts 

 improve/jients and admiring next to the green 

 sward embankments, the borders and beds of 

 vari-coloured plants and flowers which were con- 

 trasted against them. I cannot dwell on details, 

 but I have no hesitation in affirming that when 

 all the improvements projected and in progress 

 are carried out to completion, the Hakgala 

 Gardens with their combination of mountain, 

 valley, forest, ornamental plant, fern and flower 

 scenery, will, for grandeur and beauty, vie with 

 any in the eastern world. Nuwara Eliya, as a 

 health resort, has attractions of its own, but 

 extraneous to it and yet easily attainable are 

 amongst other pleasant places, these gardens 

 ''beautiful exceedingly" in themselves, and add- 

 itionally attractive from the views they command 

 of the grand mountain on whose bosom they rest 

 and of the forested ranges which close in the 

 vast-stretching grass lands and rice fields of the 

 vale of Uva. 



I suppose it is the hope of placing the Forest 

 Department on a complete footing which has so 

 long delayed a grant being placed at Mr. Nock's 

 disposal for experiments calculated to prove which 

 are the best' trees to grow on the patanas that 

 adjoin and stretch away on every side from 

 Hakgala. Meantime private enterprise has inter- 

 posed and on Albion estate, about l^ mile below 

 the Gardens, has obtained some very striking results. 

 Here amongst the limestone formations, there is a 

 small coffee estate in full bearing, which we found 

 laden with " cherries " after the fashion common 

 when coffee was really monarch, unaff'ected or 

 but inappreciably aft'ected by the fatal fungus. 

 There was but little sign of leaf-disease on this 

 coffee, which is at the foot of the property 

 and close to the road side. Up the patana- 

 covered hillsides above, stretch, at pretty 

 close intervals, shelter belts of Acacia dealbata, 

 the so-called '• silver wattle," from its silvery foliage, 

 The growth of those trees, in height and density, 

 in the fuur years of their existence, is somethin 



