Ptu, 1, 1S87.J f HE TIROP^CAL AQiaiCOLTUmSf* 



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aam*ieaaamiaala 



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is contained in many single States of the Western 

 Pepublic. The United Kingdom is even now 

 effectually worked and private enterprise is likely to 

 )io all that is required there in the way of extension. 

 There may be room on the Continent of Europe 

 to make Ceylon teas better known and to endeavour 

 to encourage consumption — to create a demand, now 

 that cotfee is getting so dear. laut it is surely 

 among the 60 millions of English-speaking people, 

 between the Atlantic and Pacitic, most of them 

 tea-drinkers or the descendants of tea-drinkers 

 from our common mother-country, that we may 

 look for encouragement and success from the 

 working of a Tea Syndicate, in placing good sound 

 Teas before the consumers, without the interference 

 of New York buyers or mixers. There may be 

 technical objections to some parts of the scheme 

 of Messrs. Pineo* and Murray ; but in its broad 

 outlines, it seems to present a feasible plan of 

 working and one by no means unfavourable to the 

 Ceylon producer. We trust it will be taken _ into 

 the careful consideration of the Planters' Association 

 and the Syndicate Committee. If all large pro- 

 prietors promised a few thousand lb. of tea each, 

 in support of the experiment, there would not be 

 much dilHculty in guaranteeing a suflicient quantity 

 to try the American market thoroughly for a year 

 at least. Perhaps Mr. Rutherford would consent 

 to make the schedule he originally drew up, form 

 the basis of a new guarantee in favour of Messrs 

 Pinoe and Murray. Both these gentlemen are too 

 well-known in Ceylon, and have too close a 

 connection with the island, to be otherwise than 

 sincerely and wholeheartedly anxious to do their 

 best for our produce. Indeed, there would be the 

 best of guarantees to this effect, namely, that their 

 own interests would be indentical with those of 

 the Ceylon planters. We trust, therefore, that the 

 present opportunity of getting a fair trial for our 

 teas on the Continent of North America, and 

 especially in the middle and Western States, may 

 not be slighted, but that through the good offices 

 of the Planters' Association and its Committee, 

 steps towr.rds the establishment of a Syndicate 

 for this purpose, may shortly be taken. 



CEYLON UPCOUNTRY PLANTING EEPORT : 



CUKIKG 01' TKA IX COLOJIUO — EAMASAMl'S IDEA OF 

 PUNCTl'AI,ITY. 



17th .Jan. 1887. 

 Is the curing of tea in Colombo which is 

 already being tried, the beginning of a big thing 

 or an expiring effort of the old system ? If fuel 

 is going to become expensive and hard for estates 

 to get, the sending of green leaf by train to 

 Colombo, may be one way to yet over the 

 difficulties. Anyhow, thirteen cents a lb, which 

 I understand is paid at present, should suit some 

 of the low-country places, and with a cheap freight 

 and a night train even some that are higher up. 

 If fuel has to be imported, it may become a ques- 

 tion whether it Vioulcl not be cheaper to have large 

 factories in Colombo for the manufacture of tea. 

 To meet the freight of the leaf, there would be 

 the saving on the carriage of lead, fuel and manufac- 

 tured tea. Of course it would be only estates near 

 a railway which could avail themselves of this plan. 

 There would require also to be special trucks for 

 tho carriage of the leaf to allow a man to pass 

 through them, who might Btir up the leaf to 

 prevent its heating ; and the factory to take 

 delivery from the planter at the railway station. 

 By this means one man travelling with the train 

 might look after the pluckings of a good many places, 

 and land them in good condition at tlie terminus. 



^ew tkali tUe cool/ is ksliag tliat he is »gaiu 



becoming of some importftnCe in Ceylon, he ig 

 waking up to a sense of his rights, and is evidently 

 not to be trifled with. A striking illustration of 

 this I heard the other day. A head kangani pre- 

 sented his " durai " with a ^Yaterbury watch so 

 that he might blow the horn regularly at four ! 



PEPJPERCOEN. 



COFFEE DISEASE IN THE PROVINCE OF 

 RIO DE JANEIRO. 



On the 18th Nov. the president of the proviuce 

 addressed a circular to the various muuicipal cham- 

 bers calling attention to the report of Sr. Glaziou, in 

 which he cliims to have discovered the origin of tho 

 coffee disease. «r. Ulaziou's report is of sufficient 

 interest to warrant our translating it in full. 



To the Coffee Planters:— 



After repeated invcstigafious I have had I he fortUna 

 to discover, on the plantations of "Boa Esperanca" 

 belonging to Jlajor Belieni and " Serra Vermlha" 

 beloiigiug to Sr. Francisco Dias Ferreira, in the muui- 

 ciprdify of C!_antag:illo, on October 22ud and 'iSrd ulto. 

 the manner iu which arises the propagation of and 

 the inoeulalion by the parasitic insect coustitutiuj 

 the present disease of the coffee trees in Brazil; and, 

 wliat is better, a positive and practical manner to 

 destroy it in little time. The cause of so lamentable 

 a damage is a microscopic insect which lives and grows 

 in the filiforiu roots of tho coffee tree, introducing 

 itself into its radical spongioles where it destroys the 

 cellular structure of tlie plant in search of fouil, and 

 when adult it creates in these same roots its nests, 

 formed into knots, which reach a diameter of one 

 to three uiilliinetres. In these knots, or nests, the 

 insect deposits its thousands of eggs. Ooncurreutlj' 

 the small radical fibres attacked by the iusec t rot 

 away, dropjnng into the surrounding ground the thou- 

 sands of eggs deposited by the insect and which may 

 be compared to the .■iporidia of a certain group of 

 mushrooms, as well from the exterior appearance 

 as from their incalculable number. 



It is in consequence of this pest that one sees tho 

 coffee plant wither, assume a yellowish color, lose its 

 new leaves at the extremities of the branches and 

 drop its fruit, already blighted by the deviation of 

 the sap which the nutritive organs had condensed 

 from the soil for the benefit of the normal life of 

 the tree. Thus attacked the plant quickly dies, 

 bequeathing to the soil the totality of the evil 

 which has caused its destruction. 



Such cases have occupied my attention for some 

 five years, and even more the manner in which planters 

 might free themselves of them, and this I have 

 positively discovered. It is this : examining with my 

 own eyes through a microscope, excavating the soil 

 myself in the coifee plantations, I recognized that 

 the cause ®f this lamentable disease exists in the 

 heaps of weeds hoed up, and nearly always drawn 

 around the coffee shrub. There these weeds rot, 

 forming little heaps of humus very ligiit and very 

 fertile, which attract the newer roots of the coffee 

 plant, and as there they are more tender 

 and more vigorous than in any other place, 

 they are immediately invaded by the pest up* to 

 the very smallest fibres in a most disheartening manner. 

 The heaps of humus formed by the residuum of 

 decomposition of these weeds are later on dissipated 

 by the rain and scattered in all the depressions of the 

 soil, and thence their animal contents penetrate so 

 much deeper into the porous soil, as this is proportion- 

 ately fertile. The penetration is less frequent in com- 

 pact, argilaceous and dry soils. 



Convinced of this fact, I hasten to recommerd to 

 interested planters never to heap the weeds and leave 

 them to rot around the coffee trees, but to fcatter them 

 between the rows, where there is sufficient sun, that 

 they may be dried as speedily as possible, and once 

 dried to collect them into heaps and burn Ihem, leaving 

 the soil of the coffee orchards perfectly c:can. It" 

 there be any difficulty in burning the weeds, it is ab- 

 solutely necessary to carry tbew out of the orchards 



