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THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[April 2, 1883. 



Public Prosecutor with the investigation of the affair. 

 The writer in the Temps then describes the 

 method of extracting quinine, and saye that the Krench 

 QiBDufacturers coniplain tliat on account of the duty 

 on spirits iu France ether costs four francs tiie 

 liter, while the Germans pay only oue franc. To 

 this fact they ascribe their iniibility to compete with 

 foreigners. The article ends by cilmin^ the fears of 

 those ready to talfe alarm, assuring than that the 

 test of the adulteration of quinine is an easy matter 

 to pharmacists and chemists, and that, now that tlieir 

 attention has been roused, they will see that what 

 passes through tlieir 1 luds is th^ genuine article. 



By a later m lil we have ri-oeivcd the following 

 from our London Correspondent : — 



"Paris, Friday, Feb. tHh. — A politico-industrial dis- 

 cussion has been raging during the last fe.v days 

 between che French, Cxermau, and Italian papers, a 

 discussion which threatens to become positively seri- 

 ous. There is a chemical manufactory at Milan 

 which some time ago amalg^imated with a German 

 one. During the late typhoid epidemic here the 

 Milan firm supplied a Paris house with considerable 

 quantities of sulphate of quinine for the hospitals. 

 It was suddenly perceived that this sulphate, which 

 costs 450f. a kilogi amine, was adulterated with a 

 subsianoo costing only 150f. The adulterated article 

 was refused, and the French newspapers denounced 

 German and Italian manufactures as fraudulent. 

 This caused a great sensation in Italy and Germany. 

 The manager of the Milanese factory hastened to 

 Paris, and it was diseovered that it was the Paris 

 house that had substituted the spurious substance 

 for the real sulphate of quinine — a fact which the 

 head of the Paris house himself admitted in a letter 

 to the manager of the Lombard factory. The latter 

 has now commenced an action against the Paris 

 house : but though the French papers, especially the 

 Temps, have acknowledged their mistake, the papers 

 of Germany and Italy continue to manifest great ir- 

 ritati')n at an accusation which mi^ht have thrown 

 discredit on their respective chemical products. The 

 action, it is to be hoped, will put an end to a dis- 

 cussion which only tends to embitter the feelings 

 between the three nations " 



CINCHONA AND TEA CULTIVATION ON 

 THE HILLS OF CEYLON. 



With reference to the fact that twigs of some of 

 our jungle trees act as poison to cinchona seedlings 

 the question arises whether the influence of stocks 

 and roots of such trees left in the soil may not 

 account to eome extent for th" refusal to grow or 

 the dying out of cinchonas ? All the mischief may 

 not be due to either climate or the conditions of 

 soil chemical or mechanical. The whole question of 

 the effect of roots and stems of trees left to gradually 

 decay in ground planted up with coffee, tea, cin- 

 chona, &o , is well worthy of investigation. Besides 

 the general effect of rotting wood as a source of 

 destructive insects and luugi, the directly poisonous 

 action of particular forest trees on the various cultiv- 

 ated plants would have to be considered. The late 

 Mr. Nietner collected much valuable information re- 

 garding the insect and fungic enemies of the coffee 

 plant. We now want a supplement or a distinct 

 treatise describing the vegetable enemies of our cult- 

 ured plants, from ag^-ratum and " wild mignonette " 

 (the latter stated to be sixteen years old iu Uva and 

 six in Dimbula) to the loftiest of our forest trees 

 which may be proved or suspected of doing injury, 

 in its living or dead state, to cotfee, tea, cincliona, 

 &c. The deadly effect on tea bushes of the decaying 

 roots of a forest tree, not yet identitied by its botanic 



and native names, is unquestionably great, groups of 

 from two to twelve plants being so poisoned to death. 

 I see that an intelligent correspondent from the 

 valley of the Peak traces paucity of feeding rootlets 

 iu the case of coffee trees to the enfeebling influence 

 of the fungus. Although he also suggests a sour 

 condition of the soil, 1 believe ho might trace scarcity 

 of bearing wood on the bushes to the same cause, the 

 fungus. I have no belief in the theory of some 

 planters that Hemlleia vastatiix existed on coffee before 

 IS69. Yellow leaves there were in plenty ; but they were 

 as different to the fatal copper-coloured masses of 

 sporangia, as day is to night. I have no more doubt 

 that the chiif cause from which our great industry 

 is suffering is the debilitating influence of the fungus 

 which first developed on our cultivated coffee in 1S69 

 than I have of my own existence. But grub has in 

 many districts also done its part, and how far timber 

 left in or on the ground to rot has been productive 

 of mischief, iu this and other ways, to coffee, and 

 also to cinchona, tea, &c. , demands full investigation. 

 As bearing on the subject, however remotely, I may 

 adduce the deadly influence of cultivated bamboos 

 on coffee in their neighbourhood, liiue gums are also 

 hurtful, and so are even cinchonas, especially succi- 

 rubras when well-grown. As living trees are hurtful 

 beyond what they produce of shade and drip — iu a 

 chemical sense — so dying and dead timber may be 

 mischievous in various degrees. A set of analyses of 

 soils and timbers and also weeds, proved or believed 

 to be specially inimical to the healthy growth of our 

 chief cultured products, such as coffee, tea, cinchona, 

 cacao, &c., would be interesting and useful. 



I am looking momentiirily for a visit from our Mon- 

 golian mentor, '^ Clia" (strongly suspected nf being a 

 Scotchman of th" crooked noxe*), and the first question 

 I am likely to put to him is " Did you mean it, when 

 yon recommended the P^akwanaites to let every tliird 

 row of tea grow itp as a breakwiud ?" I believe in 

 breakwinds, and iu tea hedges .along drains and paths 

 and across hill faces, but to devote one third of a 

 property to shelter belts takes me aback. If the 

 system became general, tea seed would have to be 

 expressed for oil and the cake used for cattle feed 

 and manure. But "Cha," perhaps, intends that the 

 shelter belts should themselves be partially pruned or 

 at any rate topped at .'> or (3 feet high so as to yield 

 some flush ? Shelter hedges of tea bushes by all means, 

 but surely not the extent of one third of an 

 estate, however windy. In walking over young 

 tea this morning, the mental note I took was that 

 wind which had blown cinchonas almost out of the 

 ground did not seem to have even checked 

 luxuriant growth, except where the exposure was 

 to the north-west. Tea will grow where cinchonas 

 and even coffee refuse to flourish ; but even tea shews 

 in its aspect the effect of different soils, aud we must 

 not be surprised if, on a large scnle, it hangs fire 

 somewhat on tliose most promising but generally most 

 disiippointing eastern fronts in this district, as far 

 as coft'ee culture is concerned. Isolated tea plants 

 grown as tea seed bearers in such positions, however, 

 have grown splendidly. Our experience here is that 

 a good As^am hybrid grows much more readily than 

 Assam indigenous trees, while some patches of China 

 plants which we were at one time advised to eradic- 

 ate, have "broadened down" into splendid flush-.vield- 

 ing surfaces. The present weather is all that could be 

 wished for lea, and we hope soon to " speed the parting 

 guests," iu the shape of the tiny moth which lodges its 

 grubs in the flush, and the leaf disease which has marked 

 some of the more mature foliage with white dots. 

 There must be something always to qualify sanguine 

 feelings and we su q)ose we may thank ul if worse never 

 overtakes our tea than the moth and the white spot. 



♦Gaelic "cam-shrou. " , 



