April i, 1887.J THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST* 



657 



falling 



to 30 per cent. To make both ends 



meet, they had to set about growing tobacco. 

 When ripe they gathered and cured the tobacco 

 at home for sale in the neighbourhood. The 

 money earned thereby, however small, proved wel- 

 come additions to the budget of the overburdened 

 cultivators. Nowadays they have to take out 

 licenses before they can plant tobacco at all. The 

 bother and expense of taking out licenses have 

 turned out so great as to deter the simple villagers 

 from growing any more tobacco. No wonder the 

 license tax has become hateful, detested, and vex- 

 atious. 



The Battaks go on merrily burning down tobacco 

 storehouses on estates. Sometimes they act on 

 one pretence and sometimes on another. In one 

 instance incendiarism was resorted to for the pur- ! 

 pose of recovering alive a Battak killed by a cer- 

 tain headman. The authorities are too busily en- 

 gaged in other matters to admit of their grappling ' 

 lirmly with this evil, no matter how hard it may \ 

 prove upon the planters. 

 83 



CONSUMPTION OF TEA. 



Those who are afraid of tea being overdone, may 

 derive encouragement from the fact that in the seven- 

 teen years between 1870 and 1885, the consumption in 

 Britain has increased by 60^ millions of lb., or by 

 about one-half of what the consumption in 1870 was. 

 The average rate of increase per annum was very 

 nearly 3^ millions of pounds, a rate which, if 

 peace is preserved and prosperity prevails, is likely 

 largely to increase with the increase of population. 

 There is every reason to believe that the present 

 depression in India and Ceylon tea is only tem- 

 porary. 



♦ ' — • 



PLANTING IN DELI. 



(Translated for the Straits Tunes.) 



A novelty in the commercial line is coming into 

 vogue in Deli. Efforts are being made by certain 

 parties there to buy up cover-leaf tobacco on the 

 spot by Europeans. Their intention is to secure 

 all the leaf available, so that none can be sent 

 to the Amsterdam market. The local Courant is 

 dead against the continuance of this practice, on 

 the ground of its trenching on the virtual mono- 

 poly of the Amsterdam tobacco dealers which, so 

 far, has worked advantageously in the interest of 

 planters, importers, and traders generally. The 

 rise of Deli as a tobacco producer, and the high | 

 position taken up in the market by that article, '. 

 are said to be mainly due to the present state of 

 things in this regard. The novelty, if allowed 

 free play, will result in Sumatra tobacco being for- 

 warded direct to smaller markets in different parts 

 of the globe instead of to one central market at 

 Amsterdam, where the multitude of dealers con- 

 gregating in the busy season, ensure competition 

 resulting in higher prices than can be secured 

 under other circumstances. 



Tobacco growing in Deli bids fair to distance 

 that branch of cultivation as carried on in Java, 

 owing to the crushing fiscal burdens weighing 

 upon growers in the latter. To bolster up the 

 failing revenue, a license tax has been imposed in 

 Java, which has proved so heavy and oppressive 

 as to be intolerable to the long suffering Java- 

 nese. The land tax is pitilessly exacted from the 

 latter in spite of the circumstance that their means 

 of meeting it are crippled by the price of rice 



FISH-BREEDING: THE HISTOEY 

 HOWIETOUN. 



OP 



The History of Howi. toan. Part I. Bv Sir J. Ram- 

 say Gibf OQ M itlaud, Bart. (Stirling, N. B. : J. B, Guy, 

 Secretary Howietoun Fis lery 1887.) 



In vi w of th: receat successful iotroduction of trout 



ova to the Nuwara Eliya Lake, our readers will be 



interested in the foUowiDg extract from a review in 



Nature : — 



P robably every one at all interested in fish-breeding 

 has heard the name of Howietoun, and a great many 

 people, especially in Scotland, have some knowledge 

 of the character of the establishment and the oper- 

 ations there carried on. Occasional paragraphs iu 

 scientific periodicals, as well as in daily papers, an- 

 nounce some experiment in the artificial stocking of 

 borne waters with some kinds of trout or with salmon 

 fry, or some successful exportation of salmonoid ova 

 to America or to the colonies at the Antipodes. The 

 name of Sir James Maitland or of Howietoun very 

 often occurs iu such announcements. Those who have 

 given attention to the subject will find much to in- 

 terest them in the account of the development of his 

 fish-farm, and in the description of its present con- 

 dition, which Sir James Maitland is now placing before 

 the public. * * * * 



In Chapter III. an elaborate account is given of the 

 methods of packing ova. The first operation is to trans- 

 fer the ova which are to be packed from the (jrilles 

 to peach netting stretched on square wooden frames. 

 This step is carried out in a specially constructed sink, 

 through which water is kept running. The ova are emp- 

 tied from Xh^arille into a wooden box, from which they 

 pass into a leaden basiu with a narrow bottom. One of 

 the frames is then floated m the sink,aud a glass measure 

 containing 1,100 eggs is used to measure the eggs from 

 the basin on to the frame. The frames are pUced 

 in the packing-room iu piles, one pile for each box. 

 Next morning the frames are examined, so that any 

 egg with an ill-developed embryo may be picked out. 

 'J'hen a square of swan's-down, contained in a special 

 tray, is placed over the eggs on the frame, and, the 

 two being suddenly reversed, the eggs rest on the 

 swan's-dowii without altering their relative position ; 

 thus each egg lies separately on the swan's-down. The 

 frame is removed, and the square of swan's-down with 

 its burden placed in o!ie of the travelling trays. 

 Above the eggs is next placed a square of felted 

 moss (Sphuf/num). Above the moss is placed another 

 layer of swan's-down carrying layer of eggs, and then 

 another layer of moss, and so on, till the travelling, 

 tray is filled. The bottom of the travelling-tray is 

 made of perforated zinc, and before any eggs are placed 

 in it, the bottom is coverved with a thia layer of'moss. 

 The eggs thus rest on swan's-down, and are covered 

 with felted moss, a layer of which also forms the 

 lowest and uppermost layer of the tray when full. For 

 journeys to the Oontiuent or America, unbleached lino 

 is substituted for the swan's-down, because swan's-down 

 retains so much carbonic acid tliat advanced embryos 

 are asphyziated. For the Antipodes, an extra precau- 

 tion has to be taken : a thin layer of moss is inserted 

 between the layer of unbleached linen and the eggs, so 

 that the latter are in contact with the moss above 

 and below. The travelling-tray is 10 inches square and 

 25 inches deep. The trays packer! in an inuer box onlj' 

 I inch larger than themselves, and this is placed in 

 an outer box 4 inches deeper and 3 inches wider than 

 the inner. Between the two is a layer of sawdust. 

 The outer box or case measures 1 foot 4 inches square, 

 by 1 foot 10 inches deep. This is the method of pack- 

 ing for short journi^ys within the United Kingdom. 

 The boxes for foreign consignments are larger, and 

 oblong in shape ; there is a sawdust space as iu the 

 boxes already described, but the trays are separated 

 by meaus of charred fillets, so that an air-space sur- 

 rounds each tray : above the pile of trays is a birge 

 ice-tray, which occupies the whole of the top of the 

 box. Ova can be safely kept in one of these boxes 

 during a period of sixtj- days. 



