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AVastk noAT, AS MANUH15. — Mr. J. A. Price, 8cran- 

 OD, Pa. believes that coal dust will make an ex- 

 cellent fertilizer. Mountains" of it, brought from the 

 mines as screenings, are pil-d up in the coal regions. 

 Its dark colour is in its favour. Dark soils are alwaj-s 

 more favorable than light ones for many purposes, 

 by reason of their absorption of heat ; and its car- 

 bonaceous properties ought to give it additional 

 value. — Gardfiicrx' Monthh;. 



NoKTH BoKXEO. — It is statcd that the British 

 Borneo Trading and Planting Company, to which 

 we have previously called attention has proceeded 

 to allotment, so that the Company may now be 

 considered as detiuitely started. Mr, Walker, who 

 will be the Manager in Borneo, was to leave Lon- 

 don about the end of February for Singapore 

 and Borneo, to commence active operations on 

 behalf of the Company. We understand the British 

 North Borneo Company, who have granted the 

 concession, accept payment for the 20,000 acres 

 allotted to the Company in shares. The directors 

 are Messrs. C. Bennett (Brolin Bennett A: Co.), E. 

 Locke (Taylor & Locke), J. A. Travers, and J. J. 

 Dunn, the concessionaire. — Straits Times. 



" Cocoes" — (Where is this Coniusion to Stoi' ?). 

 — At a meeting of the Linuean Society on March 

 3rd, there was read a paper on " Disease of Cocoes 

 at Jamaica," by Messrs. G. Massee and D. Morris, 

 F.L.S. It appears that a somewhat virulent disease 

 has made its appearance amongst cocoes (or, as 

 they are sometimes called, tanias eddoes or taros) 

 in the parish of Portland, Jamaica, and the matter 

 has been taken up by Ciovernment, by whom speci- 

 mens were sent to Kew for examination. Cocoes 

 form an important item in the food supply of the 

 negroes, and the loss of such a food would be a 

 serious matter to them. It appears that the plants 

 are attacked by a disease very similar to the potato 

 mildew, and which, being a new opecieg, has been 

 named Frronospura trichotoma. The authors of the 

 paper have drawn attention to the nature of the 

 disease, and indicated the practical steps to be 

 taken in order to contend successfully with it. It 

 is hoped that stringent measures will be adopted 

 to confine the affected plants within the district 

 in which they were first found and that they will 

 be thoroughly destroyed by burning. Fresh cultiv- 

 ation should be started with plants from a district 

 free from disease.— C'oZo?iu.--- and India. 



Avenues or Distkicx Roads. — The following 

 letter appears in the Indian Agriculturist :— • 



To the editor.— Sir,— Referring to the letter on 

 " Avenues on District Koads " appearing in the issue 

 of your paper dated 1st April 1879, page 139, I shall 

 feel greatly obliged if you will be good enougli to in- 

 form me whether any great extent of the roadsides 

 in India have been so cultivated; and if so, the num- 

 ber of miles so cultivated, the aggregate number of 

 treea and plants now growing, the system of cultiva- 

 tion, whether by day labour or otherwise, the average 

 expenditure on each tree till maturity, and the average 

 estimated profit to Government on each tree at felling. 



CiiAs. Stoutek, 



Jany . 30th, 1?87 . Audit Office, Colombo, Ceylon, 



Note. — This is rather an extensive enquiry, requiring 

 much time and trouble. We shall do what we can in- 

 a future issue to supply the information to some extent; 

 meanwhile some of our readero might help our cor- 

 respondent. — Ep. i. A. 



To which we have to add that Mr. 

 (Stouter of the Audit Office, Colombo, is very com- 

 tn-chensive in his enquiries and the editor 

 of the Indian. Aoi-iculturist very good-natured 

 in not having referred him to the Agriculture 

 Department of the Indian Government. Since the 

 days of the Mogul Emperors tree avenues, on the 

 great trunk as well as district roads, have been 

 encouraged. Kecently a fresh impetus has been 



sivea to tUc snterpri^. Bd it xQiaQmhexQi tiut 



it is only in climates which for large portions 

 of the year are rainless that trees can be planted 

 along side of roads without serious injury to 

 the roads. In the hot season in India the shade 

 of the pipul, nini and cassia trees is most grateful. 



Good ; ir True. — According to the London corre- 

 spoudeut of the S. M. Herald, a sugar-tree more pro- 

 ductive than the .sugar-cane, is attracting attention 

 in India. It is called the mahwa or moola tree, and 

 grows in Southern Hiiidustan, and in the northerly 

 regions abutting on the Himalaya Mountains. The 

 mahwa bears about a ton of blossoms, and each flower 

 is little else but a vegetable envelope filled with 

 pure saccharine matter. One ton of blossoms will 

 yield abont half-a-tou of sugar. The best managed 

 cane-plantations of the West Indies do not, at the 

 outside, yield more than two and a half or three 

 Ions of sugar to the acre. The French and German 

 beet -fields do not produce more than fifteen to twenty 

 tons of beet to the acre, which yield about 7 per 

 cent of sugar, or rather less than an acre of sugar- 

 cane. Five mahwa trees will j ield the same amount 

 of raw sugar as an acre of sugar-cane ; and an acre 

 which would contain from 200 to i-SO trees, would 

 produce enough blossom to give from 100 to 120 tons 

 of sugar, beside vvhich no expense would be incurred 

 either in growing or harvesting. A consignment of the 

 mahwa blossoms is on its way to the Continent, for tlie 

 opinion of the sugar refiners to be given thereon.— P/<r/i<tc 

 and. Fanner. [There is sugar enough in the mahwa 

 blossoms to render them acceptable and nutritious food 

 to the natives, and spirits can be distilled from the 

 blossoms. But the statements about sugar obtained 

 from them is from gross exaggeration. — Ed.] 



Badvlla DisTKicT, 2(jth March. — Heavy showers, 

 accompanied with much thunder and severe light- 

 ning, have fallen over the greater portion of Upper 

 LJva. The electric disturbance has been very great ; 

 the thunder clouds seemed to gyrate round and round 

 from Idulgashena or Haputale to Hakgalla, across 

 to Idapussellawa and Maturata, and from Naran- 

 galla to Hewa Eliya rock, along the whole Madul- 

 sima range to Namunakuly and Ella rock to Lean- 

 gahawella and Haputale. The showers have been 

 heavy, but partial ; still I do not think any part of 

 the district can have escaped getting a portion of 

 the very welcome rain. The long-continued, dry 

 weather, amounting in some places to absolute 

 drought, is almost unprecedented here at thia 

 season, and tea and cinchona refused to Hush or to 

 grow ; the cold, dry wind, sometimes almost a hurri- 

 cane during the night, followed by scorching dry 

 sun without a cloud in the sky, was trying to afl 

 vegetation ; only coffee, where sheltered from the 

 wind, seeraed to revel in the dry sunshine, and 

 even green bug has departed, for the time being at 

 least. Canker in cinchona has almost disappeared, 

 but only the hardy acclimated varieties arc now 

 grown. Uva cinchona has barely "touched" the 

 market yet, and wise planters continue to plant 

 their own seedlings on the principle of the Scotch- 

 man's advice to his son; "Keep sticking in a tree, 

 Sandy, they will gi'ow when you are sleeping," No 

 fancy varieties of cinchona are planted here now, 

 costing fabulous prices for seed — say " EloO per 

 gram." !~ but there is no estate where thousands of 

 hardy, acclimated, self-sown hybrids and "sports'' 

 cannot be planted at a nominal cost, without risk 

 of failure, and without hurt to other products. 

 These trees grow v.-hilst the proprietor " sleeps," 

 but some day he wakes lip to find a very valuable 

 property in large, healthy cinchona trees, scattered 

 over his property in places where nothing else 

 would grow, and, even at 3d. a unit of quinine, a 

 very valuable accessory to the other produce oC his 

 estate. Let no one think Uva cinchona will sliortly 

 be " snufi'ed out," "cropped out," or "cutout." 

 Cinchona will continue to be a larji export froiS 



Uva »s Ions 3,$ tha f roviace I&sts, 



