June i, 1887.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



795 



them to purchase. We know of one garden where 

 the proprietor has had his broken tea made up in 

 ounce packets, each packet labelled in two or three 

 vernaculars with the price, " two pice," distinctly mar- 

 ked on them. These packets have been sold largely 

 along the line of railway, and in the larger towns, 

 and the sale is steadily increasing. This is doubtless 

 one of several instances of similar enterprise, but as 

 yet the consumption does not affect the gross out- 

 turn. That it will eveniually do so, if the trade is 

 properly fostered and encouraged we fully believe. 



TOBACCO IN NETHEELANDS INDIA. 



(Translated for the Straits Timei.) 

 Count de Gelvos d'EIsloo has started a venture 

 under the style of the Borneo Tobacco Company, 

 of which he will be manager. The company which 

 is domiciled at Batavia, intends to carry on the 

 cultivation of land in British North Borneo for to- 

 bacco growing, besides taking in hand the purchas- 

 ing and curing of tobacco and its sale in Netherlands 

 India and elsewhere. The articles of Association pro- 

 vide for the existence of the company during thirty 

 consecutive years. Tbe company has acquired rights 

 in four thousand acres of waste land near the Ranau 

 River in British North Borneo. The company's 

 capital, has been fixed at two hundred and forty 

 thousand guilders in two hundred and forty shares. 

 The management of the company will be conducted 

 by one director and two commissaries. lu Borneo, 

 the affairs of the company will be looked after by a 

 manager under iastractious from the director. 



TOBACCO PLANTING IN DELI. 



(Translated for the Straits Times.) 

 The Deli Courant takes up the subject of the vast 

 power for mischief exercised by tindals on estates in 

 Deli, which the Chinese official commissioners recently 

 on a tour of inspection reported upon as one drawback 

 to cooly life ther*. The evil is inseparable from the 

 difficulties of getting on there with labourers, whose 

 language hardly any planters are masters of. But it 

 has been intensified by the employers leaving the hands 

 of the tindals free to deal with the coolies without ex- 

 erting themselves to keep them in check. Atp.^esent, 

 the assistants, from ignorance of the Chinese language, 

 have to rely on the tindals for interpretation. The only 

 remedy for this spreading evil seems to be to raise the 

 salary of assistants who set to work studying the 

 Chinese language, and who endeavour as soon as pos- 

 sible, however defectively, to make themselves under- 

 stood by the coolies. It is expected that, on estates 

 where many newly arrived immigrants are engaged, 

 the presence of European employees so qualified will 

 bring on satisfactory results. It is well knorn that the 

 Chinese tindals are most successful in impressing upon 

 these new comers a high idea of their power, and 

 of The need for their interference. 



Even European assistants abuse their power over the 

 coolies of whom they have charge. Early, last month, 

 the authorities in Deli had no fther alternative than to 

 deal sternly with the manager of the Ludwigsburg estate, 

 charged with ill-treating coolies. An arrest like this 

 will be sure to deepen the unfavourable impression of 

 cooly life in Dtdi entertained in some quarters, though 

 bringing him to book shows that the authorities not 

 only have the power, but also the will to protect the 

 coolies. Many planters do not seem to realise this. 

 The arrests of several managers on similar charges 

 within the last few months have failed as deterrent 

 examples. Tliey cannot understand that the Govern- 

 ment will not allow coolies to be ill-treated. Under 

 such circumstances, those who will not hear must be 

 made to feel the consequences of flagrant wrong- 

 doing. 



The tobacco grown in North Borneo turns out to be 

 nowise inferior to the Deli article, as is evidenced by 

 the high prices it commands. From all accounts, the 

 climate and soil of North Borneo are admirably adapted 

 to that branch of cultivation. Keports of the granting 

 of land concessions and the floating of companies to 



operate there, are in the air. Tobacco growing has 

 irdeed come into prominence in + bat quarter. Under 

 the Netherlands Indian Government, as soon as a 

 planter begins to make money out of his venture, 

 the fiscal screw is at once put on. Taxes, rates, and 

 cesses are piled on him. Their ciuehing weight 

 stands in the way of sound development, and stunts 

 the growth of planting enterprise. Not only in North 

 Borneo but also in Siak, competition is epringiug up. 

 But, owing to the latter country being under the 

 Netherlands' flag, the danger is not so great. The 

 Government will not fail quickly to lay taxes on the 

 planters, when they have just started on the hard task 

 of bringing primeval waste land under cultivation. 

 For all that it is competition, however shackled. Its 

 inevitable effect will be to bring on increase of pro- 

 duction. These two factors when they once come into 

 play, bid fair to put an end to the monopoly hitherto 

 enjoyed by Deli planters, which in addition to the 

 excellent quality of the tobacco turned out, has had 

 a material efl'ect in keepiog up the extraordiuarily 

 high prices realised by that article. In Deli, eyes are 

 beginning to be opened to the necessity for turning 

 the land there to account for other kinds of culti- 

 vation than that of tobacco. It is only by resolutely 

 working on these lines, that Deli will continue to 

 be a money-making settlement, an ^exception, by-the- 

 bye, in Netherlands India. 



PLANTING &c., IN MANILA, 



TOBACCO, DYEWOOD, COPFBE, INDIGO, PEABL-SHElLS, 



(Translated for the Straits Times.) 

 All through last year, the depression of trade had 

 prevailed far and wide in the Philippines. The value 

 of hemp exported has fallen off by nearly half a mil- 

 lion of dollars. The decrease in this respect, partly 

 arises from inferior quality of the fibre brought to 

 market owing to bad curing. The supplies available 

 either fetch low prices or are rejected, the producers 

 suffering in either case. Sugar shows a still more 

 marked falling off, it being one-tenth compared with 

 the export figures in 1885. 



Dyewood exports have not escaped from being 

 affected by the prevailing depression. Neither have 

 those in cigars undergone any change for the better. 

 Several houses see the importance of turning out a 

 serviceable product, so as to keep up the whilom high 

 reputation of the Philippine article. But others setting 

 present gain above future loss, counteract tlieir efforts 

 by bringing out low priced cigars, no matter how 

 indifferent the quality may prove to be. The inferior 

 articles are exported on their account, thereby doing 

 wide spread harm to the reputation of a product which 

 had distanced all competitors up to the time of the 

 abolition of the tobacco monopoly in the Philippines. 

 The abolition of the Government tobacco monopoly 

 in the Philippines, has taken effect unfavourably not 

 only on cigars, but also on leaf tobacco exported. Four 

 years have passed away since that measure came into 

 force. However beneficial the reform may prove to be in 

 after years, tobacco as raw material or as cigars, still 

 falls short of the mark reached in monopoly times, 

 both in yield and quality. Growers have never real- 

 ised the fact that free trade in tobacco did not mean 

 liberty for them to cultivate that article badly and 

 cure it worse, but afforded them an opportunity for 

 turning out a product superior enough to bring 

 higher prices than the Treasury paid them in the 

 days of the monopoly. In those times, the Govern- 

 ment had an intere»^t iu the outturn proving of 

 marketable quality. Nowadays, with no influence for 

 good to keep them on the right path, the cultiva- 

 tors, naturally heedless and neglectful, grow a crop 

 anyhow without a thought of the care and finish 

 required to render the article acceptable. Their 

 only object is to bring it to market as soon as 

 possible, no matter how inferior the quality. 

 Sometimes the crop is sold before it is cut, neg- 

 lect in the case being grosser. The crop, un- 

 der such circumstances, fails to bring the prices ex- 

 pected when it reaches Manila. Cultivators become 

 discouraged. In place of trying to mend matters, 

 they grow reckless. A few growers aud dealers are 



