March i, 1883.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



729 



HOW TO EKADIOATE WHITE ANTS. 



TO THE EDITOR OF THE AUSTRALASIAN. 



Kerosene is said to be au effective remedy against the 

 ravages of white ants. I do not deny that kerosene may 

 act as a preventive where particular beams or pieces of 

 timber can be dressed with it, but if the termites have 

 got well established in a woodun building it takes more 

 than a dressing of kerosene to eradicate them. AVheu I 

 deal \vith the pests I like to exterminate them, and I 

 find I can do so quite easily by poisoning them with 

 arsenic. I sprinkle the arsenic ou them ; this soon takes 

 effect upon their soft bodies {although often not before 

 they have travelled some distance into their recesses), 

 and they are killed. Of course they are eaten Ijy their 

 friends, according to the ancient usages of termites, who 

 in their turn are all poisoned. Now, in making this state- 

 ment I am not doing so after a hasty and incomplete ex- 

 periment, but after about seven years' experience, during 

 which time I have never failed to absolutely eradicate 

 them from any wooden structure with the greatest ease. 

 I have tried all sorts of houses, fences, dead trees, and 

 even the ant heaps in and on the ground, and in every 

 case I found T could poison every one in a week or so 

 at the outside, and generally with one cU'essiug. I find 

 it is important to get as many as possible of the insects 

 to dose with the arsenic in the fii'st instance ; therefore 

 as soon as I know they have taken possession of a 

 wooden structure, and see where they are situated, I 

 make a point of avoiding disturbing them until I have 

 procured a pound or two of arsenic, and put some of it 

 into a pepper box, or convenient tin with a perforated 

 lid, so that as soon as I uncover a number of the insects 

 by taking off a board, or part of the timber they are 

 in, or breaking into then" covered ways, I can dust the 

 arsenic over as many as I can see, doing this freely wher- 

 ever I can find them. I also find a tin tube about 

 half an inch diameter, or piece of paper rolled up into 

 a tube, very handy to get at nooks and crevices where 

 the pepper bos cannot be used. By taking up some of 

 the arsenic in one end of the tube and blowing sharply 

 through the other, the arsenic can sometimes be scattered 

 over theui when otlierwise they would be difficult of ac- 

 cess. I think it would be an excellent thing to place a 

 few pounds of arsenic in a building when it is being 

 built, inside the lining boards, along the lower wall plates, 

 where it would be out of reach of everything- but insects. 

 This woukl prevent the white ant from ever approaching 

 that part of the building, and we all know it is up the 

 inside of the lining boards, or under the floors of build- 

 ings, where they find their most comfortable quarters. I 

 find it an advantage to look for their nests in the vicinity 

 of my houses and buildings, and whenever a nest is found 

 to poison it at once. By this means not only your 

 buildings but the whole of the vicinity can be freed from 

 them. A. M'DOWALL. 



Maryborough, Queensland. 



TEA IN THE NOETH-AVEST PROVINCES 



OF INDIA AND PUNJ^VB. 



Under this title Mr. Liotard, of the Revenue and Agricult- 

 ural Department, has issued a paper, in which he discusses 

 the causes of the non-development of the tea industry 

 in the above-named quarter. The districts in the North- 

 west Provinces where tea is grown are Kumaon. Garhwal 

 and Dehra Dun ; and in the Punjab, Kangra, where alone 

 the industry is extensively carried on. There were 1,42 i 

 plantations in Kangra in 18S1, forty of them being large 

 ones; the rest small plots, owned chiefly by natives. 

 Tea cultivation was introduced into the district more than 

 30 years ago by the agency of the State, and since then 

 a considerable amount of English capital has been invested 

 in it. In As.sam Mr. Liotard says the average out-turn 

 of tea per acre is about 282 lbs., in Bengal 220 lbs., and 

 in Kangra 168 lt)S. only. The small yield in the latter 

 case is a natm'al consequence of the climate, but it favours 

 the production of high class teas. We recently pointed 

 out in these columns the grievous check which the ex- 

 portation of Indian teas to Centra! Asian countries was 

 receiving en account of the prohibitive duties imposed by 

 Russia. Hitherto, the North-western Provinces and the 



Punjab have been confined to their local markets and those 

 of the adjoining Indian provinces, and to Cabul and Cashmere 

 and through these to the foreign territories beyond, for 

 the disposal of their tea. The imposition by the Russian 

 Government of a duty equal to Rl-8 a seer on all foreign 

 tea imi^orted into Turkestan, is calculated to have a most 

 unfortunate effect upDU the tea industry in the provinces 

 we have been referring to. Under these circumstances 

 Mr. Liotard recommends that an association like the Calcutta 

 Syndicate be formed. That would be a representative body 

 who could institute inquiries as to the quality of tea most 

 appreciated in the countries in which there exist prospects 

 of finding a market, as to the exact mode in practice 

 of packing and presenting the produce, as to the prices 

 at which such tea sells in the dift'erent countries, &c. 

 "It would, in fact (says Mr. Liotard), give information 

 and advice on all necessary points, and would arrange 

 for its own agents not only in the Indian markets, but 

 for export to otlier countries. If tea of foreign manufact- 

 m'e is found too cheap to be successfully competed with, 

 there woukl apparently be foiu* courses open — (1) to reduce 

 working charges at the plantations and elsewhere, (2) to 

 turn from Calcutta to Ijombay and Kurrachee as their chief 

 export centres, (3) to seek a reduction of railway freight 

 for tea, and (4) to memorialise for more favourable Waste 

 Laud Rules." Mr. Liotard, basing his conclusion ou a review 

 of the present export and import trade of this country 

 in tea, advises the planters of the Punjab and North-Western 

 Provinces to look for markets in the United States, Persia, 

 Aden, Turkey in Asia, and Egypt, as well as Cabul, Cashmere, 

 and Ladakb, all of which countries already take Indian 

 tea to a considerable extent. 



The following correspondence, which we are requested 

 to publish, shows that in London an effort is being made 

 to promote the trade with Turkestan : — 



Indian Tea Districts' Association. 



London, Nov. 28, 1882. 



Sir, — I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of 

 your letter of the 15th instant, and to thank you for the 

 information therein contained. 



1 am desired by the Committee to express the regret 

 with which they have learnt that the Russian authorities 

 have placed so heavy a duty as 14 roubles 14* kopecs per 

 pud of 3G lbs. on all Indian teas imported into Russian 

 Turkestan, and tiieir hope that her Rlajesty's Government 

 will do all that lies in their power to induce the Russian 

 authorities _to allow free importation again. — I have, Scz., 



Ernest Tye, Secretary. 



Foreign Office, Nov. 30, 1S82. 

 Sii', — I am directed by Earl Granville to acknowledge 

 the receipt of your letter of the 28th iust. ou the subject 

 of the duty imposed in Russian Tm'kestan on lut^lian tea, 

 and in reply I am to request you to state to the Indian 

 Tea Districts Association that the matter will continue 

 to receive the attention of her Majesty's Government. — 

 I am, &c., Charles "W. Dilke. 



— Home and Colonial 3fail. 



TEi.DEYING:-No. II. 



{Continued from parj<t 630.) 

 Under what some planters call the good old system, 

 the tea was dried on t\w dholex, placed over charcoal 

 fires. It was considered the best plan to dry it 

 slowly, or at any rate to dry it most thoroughly. 

 When the tea was placed on the trays over the tire, 

 it was spread thickly, so that the heat did not strike 

 it sharply, and that the whole trayful might gi-t its 

 due proportion of heat these trays were continually 

 removed, and the tea carefully mixed by hand, in 

 such a w.iy that the top layer was placed nearer the 

 lire. To i-tfect this d/iolei had of course to be moved 

 .iw.iy from over the tires, else some of the leaves 

 would have fallen through ou the fire, resulting in 

 Hame and .smoke, which would have destroyed the 

 flavour of tue whole tr:iyful. If the fire brisk, the 

 tea dried in a very short spice of time, ■' hile a coni- 

 piratively »low rire required more time. We have 

 always held the opinion that a, slow fire did work 



