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sea, in this scattered township, like our Ceylon 

 back waters. Another excursion was to Port Maria, 

 the " capital " o£ the Parish : this is as yet the 

 prettiest spot I have seen in Jamaica ; picture to 

 youraelf a very pretty Bay, with a small islet m the 

 centre, overhanging cliffs, a deep blue Mediterranean 

 Sea, so that were it not for tropical surround- 

 dings one might be supposed to be in Cornwall, 

 or Guernsey. Indeed the country for some miles 

 before reaching Port Maria has quite an English 

 look, favouring our Sussex and Surrey hill slopes, 

 and the splendid pastures in which cattle, sheep 

 and stock generally are seen browsing so con- 

 tentedly. Of course, the sugar, the palms and the 

 bananas break the "home spell;" nevertheless it 

 it is all very pretty. From the Rectory, situate on a. 

 hill overlooking the bay and town, the sight is 

 very picturesque : you thence look down upon the 

 pretty Church close by the sea, the fine Court- 

 house, the police station, Wesleyan Chapel, and 

 clean-looking little town, well supplied with water, 

 and boasting two or more fountains. Beyond is a 

 second small Bay or cove ; here we lunched and 

 could have fancied ourselves back at Kalutara, or 

 Bentota, as we sat under the shade of the coco- 

 nut trees, the waves almost washing our feet. 

 Another visit I paid was to " Claremont, 

 once the residence of the East family (of Tom 

 Cringle's Log fame) in the grand old times ; fancy 

 an upstairs house which as you vide up to it, 

 recalls memories of the Pavilion, Kandy, though 

 perhaps not quite as large, but the lower story 

 uninhabited and fast going to decay. These old 

 Jamaican "Nabobs" (to use an Indian term) lived 

 like princes. This property some thousand acres in 

 extent was bought not so very many years ago for 

 JE500, house and land full of valuable log wood, 

 trees, and valuable also as a capital grazing pen, 

 and Banana "walk;" but good parochial roads is 

 Jamaica's great want to enable planters to get their 

 produce safely and cheaply to the shipping ports. 

 This log wood, together with the bananas, has been 

 the mainstay of many sugar planters, since prices 

 of sugar fell so very low. It grows, as I have already 

 stated, indigenously and £1 10s. a ton can be 

 cleared off it, delivered at the wharf. As to sugar 

 not paying, I was told it could be produced for 

 about £10 a hogshead, nearly its present value 

 in the market; but when the rum is taken mto 

 account it becomes a valuable factor, as it can 

 be produced at a profit of £5, a puncheon, 

 thus leaving the planter something at least to 

 live upon. In good seasons, bananas are also 

 very profitable, yielding all round about £10 

 the 100 bunches ; the price is highest during the 

 summer months up to August. But in all tropi- 

 cal countries one must be prepared for damage 

 by storms floods and hurricanes, and when they 

 are out they sadly damage the planters' prospects. 

 Still we should not grumble for even European 

 countries are subject to like contingences, Witness 

 the late dreadful gales in England which have 

 done so much damage to shipping, and gardens 

 and horticulture generally, branches of fine trees 

 Being broken down by the heavy weight of snow. 



W. 3. 



CHINA TEA AND ITS BlVALS, 

 The cultivation of the tea plant is extending so 

 rapidly, and is being commenced in uo manv coun- 

 tries, that the Chinese tea growers will have to 

 look seriously to the improvement of their stock, 

 and the Chinese Government will equally have to 

 see that the export du'ies upon the leaf are not 

 made so heavy as to serve to place it at a dis- 

 advantage in its competition with the tea of India, 

 ;apau, Jav», Ceyloo and South Africa. That tba 



product of China is gradually losing ground in the 

 English market, and its place being taken by its 

 younger rivals will be seen by a glance at the 

 imports into the United Kingdom during the past 

 three years, which are as follows : — 



1884. 1885. 1886, 



lb. lb. lb. 



China tea .. 140,284,000 136,-523,020 110,610,749 



Japan tea .. 84,000 72,760 51,200 



.Java tea .. 3,586,000 3,345,020 3,946,110 



India & Ceylon tea 67,152,000 66,862,614 83,465,164 

 Thus, while the total British import has grown 

 from 211,106,0001b. in the year 1884 to 228,073,2231b. 

 in 1886, the increase in China tea is represented 

 in 1886 by only 326,7491b. and in 1885 there was 

 an actual decline in the import of 3,760,9801b. 

 During the same time the import of Indian and 

 Ceylon tea has increased by nearly twenty-six and 

 a-half million pounds. Last year, too. South Afri- 

 can tea made its first appearance on the English 

 market, some .5,000'b. having been imported. The 

 land under tea cultivation both in Ceylon and India 

 is meanwhile annually increasing greatly, and it is 

 now seriously proposed to start tea gardens in 

 Burmah. A correspondent of one of eur Rangoon 

 contemporaries, discussing the project, says that a 

 market would be found on the spot for all the tea 

 that could be produced, and there would be no 

 necessity for exporting any of it for many a year 

 to come. "The climate and soil," he adds, "are 

 favourable to hybridising, and in this way im- 

 portant improvements in quality would prob- 

 ably be accomplished, and the outturn per acre 

 would soon compare favourably with that obtained 

 in the best tea-growing districts of India." The 

 only serious difficulty in Burmah would be the 

 labour question, but this difficulty would not long 

 stand in the way, seeing the vast supply of 

 surplus labour so easily obtainable from the ad- 

 joining provinces of 'India. The probability is 

 therefore that in a few years more Burmah will 

 take a place among the tea-producing countries, 

 and be one more rival to China. The idea of 

 starting tea plantations in some of the Malay 

 States has also more than once been mooted, and 

 is pretty certain to be carried out at no very 

 distant date. The Chinese tea-planters will there- 

 fore in real earnest have to look well to their 

 interests. Sir Robert Hart has already administered 

 one much needed warning that the foreign tea 

 trade will slip from their grasp unless they 

 make serious efforts to retain it, and the 

 Chinese Authorities have recognised the importance 

 of the question by issuing a proclamation to the 

 tea-growers, setting forth the necessity of maintain, 

 ing the standard of their production, but warnings 

 on such matters are little heeded as a rule m 

 China, the anxiety of the producers being generaly 

 limited to the requirements of the moment. Chi- 

 nese agriculturists take little thought for the mor- 

 row, and they are not only essentially conservative 

 in their methods but areatly prone to kill the 

 goose that lays the golden eggs. In Indian tea 

 plantations science is brought to bear to improve 

 the stock and to facilitate the drying .and curing 

 processes ; while in China the methods of a cen- 

 tury back are still employed, and no effort is made 

 at improvement. The result is a comp aint of de- 

 terioration of the teas, and their gradual displace, 

 ment in the British markets by the carefully picked, 

 sorted, and cured teas of India and Cey- 

 lon. The latter are also making their way in the 

 Australian colonies. The export of Indian tea from 

 Calcutta to Australia and New Zealand in 1886 

 was 1,539,530 1b. as compared with l,8b7,92o lb. 

 in 1885, and 1,029,463 lb. in 1884. In 188o the 

 import was rather too suddenly increased, being 

 almost doubled, but that the leaf has grown greatly 



