April 2, 1883.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST, 



839 



upper trays and to exclude the air, which would other- 

 wise enter the hood from the outside of the stack. 



To remove a ti-ay frOJi the top, the curtain may be 

 •asily drawn out of the way, and will immediately re- 

 sume its place after the tray is detached from the stack. 

 Since the hood remains stationary, the curtain forms a 

 convenient prolongation thereof, useful at such times as 

 before the stack reaches its ultimate height ; and inas- 

 much as the curtain will immediately resume its proper 

 place after having been disan-anged, but httle fresh air 

 can enter to cool and check the di'aft through the stack. 

 While green tea leaves are dried to one-fourth 

 their weight, one-sixth seems a good return in the 

 ease of apples. We learn that the French distillers 

 are using large quantities of dried apples for the 

 manufacture of brandy! The following euccint 

 account, of the evaporator will give our readers 

 a. clear idea of the main principles employed, and 

 e.\pert8 can judge whether what answers for evapor- 

 ating soft fruits and vegetables could not easily be 

 adapted to the purpose of drying tea leaves : — 



Extract from Peninsular News and Advertiser, Milfordj 

 Delaware, May 2Bth; 1877 ■— 



" The Automatic Fruit Evaporator." — This new candidate 

 for the favor of the fruit growers, has been set up and is 

 now in operation in this town. We have inspected it 

 closely, and observed it carefully, and are inclined to the 

 opinion that it meets a long felt want; first, because of 

 the excellent work it does on the tnie evapoi-atin// principle 

 and second, because of the low cost of the machine. It 

 consists essentially of a series of trays resting one upon 

 the other, and forming a tight evaporating tower througd 

 which the heat passes from a well-designed and constructeh 

 furnace at the bottom. 



The furnace appears to be a perfect piece of mechan- 

 ism, and generates the heat in an economical manner. 

 The travs are all entered at the bottom, filled with the 

 green fruit, and the pile is easily and evenly raised by 

 a crane power tiu-ued by a crank, so that evea when 

 full the whole pile is easily lifted and the fresh tray slid 

 in over the heat box on an iron railway. When the trays 

 are all full those first entered are at the top of the pile 

 and are mured ready to be removed and the tray filled 

 and slid in at the bottom to start with its second load 

 through the machine. It is well constructed^ works adniir' 

 ably and appears to he a t/reat success. 



The points most admirably covered by it are : — 



1st. The true evaporating principle of a rising column of 

 heated air passing throughtha trays in its progress upward. 



2nd. Economy in rimning. 



3rd. Moderate cost of the machine. 



4th. Great capacity and jierfect distribution of heat over 

 all parts of the fruit trays. 



Cinchona Bark Harvesting. 



20th March. 

 As I write, a cooly brings a parcel and the follow- 

 ing interesting note regardmg the harvesting of cin- 

 chona bark : — 



"Dimbula, 20th March. — In the Observer of I3th 

 I see a paragraph about harvesting cinchona and 

 'shaving extraordinary' by a Dolosbage planter. 

 As you take a deep interest in all our new and old 

 products, I send you our cinchona account book, which 

 you can at your leisure look over, and compare notes, 

 and return at your convenience : it may interest you, 

 and beats your Dolosbage friend's shaving to sticks. 

 We got as much in as 324, 337, 368 and 404 pounds 

 of wet bark per cooly on some days in July, our 

 average on the whole being 244 lb per man. 



" The tolah are brought down daily;: you will see at a 

 glance the number of men daily, thequantity of work each 

 man did, &c., &c 149 men shaved 30,473 tt> from 

 19,853 trees, giving approximately, 1 '81 lb of wi-t bark 

 per tree. The quantities alter atdifferenttiines, as you will 

 eee from the different shavings. We only kept in thi,^ 

 book the number of men for the shaving process ; 

 in taking the quill, bark &c. from the sickly 

 trees we did not keep the account in the same way. 



" Wa shaved in (be wet weather, and that may to 



some extent account for the larger quantity of bark 

 brought in on some days. 



" 1 hope the heavy rains we have been getting 

 won't damage our blossoms. They have been 

 very fairly good where we have good wood, and we are 

 all now in need of a decent crop." 



Cinchona bark as a general rule dries down to about 

 33^ per cent of its weight as taken from the tree, 

 but, as the shaving in this case was performed in wet 

 weather, let us adopt 30 per cent for marketable 

 bark. In that case the maximum of 404 lb. would 

 give as its equivalent somewhat over 120 lb., while 

 the average of 244^ would give about 73 lb-, and : 

 the average of wet bark per tree 1'81 lb. may be '< 

 taken to represent a little over 4 lb. of dry bark. These 

 are certainly very satisfactory results as to quantity, 

 and we trust the prices realized will leave a. good 

 profit to the owners of the 19,853 trees operated on. 



2l6t March. 



I have watched with much interest the progress of 

 some luxuriant groves of cinchona, calculated to remind 

 me of those in which I once took such pride, but the 

 larger portion of the trees of which succumbetl in the 

 to third the fifth year from planting out. Three months 

 ago, I hoped that root disease and stem canker might 

 not find access to the groves alluded to. But the 

 inevitable must be, and one-third of the ti-ees are in 

 the course of uprootal. As in our own case, so in 

 this, of course the bark will be profitably utilized, 

 but it is hard to see trees on whose comparaative 

 permanency planters have relied to compensiite them ' 

 for disappointments with coffee, thus "dying off." ' 

 As in all previous cases, the vast bulk of the delicate' . 

 trees are otfioinalis. .Succirubra, although not exempt, ' 

 is by no means so liable to disease, while the robust 

 hybrids resist adverse influences best of all, although 

 I have heard of even a few of these giving way. I 

 believe I may add that where the stem canker has ' 

 now appeared with such fatal effect the Australian'' 

 blue gums have not suffered to any appreciable ex- ' (. 

 tent. We may, therefore, possibly, be alile finally 

 to dismiss the idea that the eucalypts are soui-ces 

 of infection : tliey simply suffer intensely in cold, 

 wet, exposed situations. In the course of my walk .1 , 

 saw calisayas flourishing equally with succirubras and 

 hybrids in the subsoil by the side of the cart road, 

 and it seemed as if the amount of shade from forest 

 left standing above the road was beneficial. Having 

 heard of the success of a rather extensive plot o^ ,. 

 calisayas planted under tree shade, I diverged from,,, 

 the main road to have a look at the experiment. , , 

 Most of the forest trees which originally gave shade ; 

 now stand up naked skeletons, such as the traveller , 

 in Australia is too familiar with .is he passes through 

 forests of " ringed " trees, over which the fire ash, , 

 passed. At a distance from the forest which is stUl ^ 

 standing there was a fine group of trees on the top , 

 of a knoll. Down the sides of this knoll the trees 

 were in all stages of decay. On the top of a larger 

 knoll, sheltered from the uortii-east winds by the 

 standing forest, there was a really fine expanse of 

 flourishing calisayas ; but decay appeared as we got 

 down and to the outskirts. The experience here with 

 calisayas is that which is general with officinalis ; 

 but the exceptions are such as to set rule at de- 

 fiance. In damp ravines, it seems useless to attempt 

 to grow cinchonas, and yet I have seen isolated plants 

 flourishing with their feet permanently wet. I have 

 in close juxtaposition two fine I ill slopes. On one 

 nearly every tree has disappeared from the top por- 

 tion, while a fine group survi\es at the base. In 

 the other case the very reverse results have taken 

 place. No doubt free soil, even if gravelly, is favour- 

 able for these trees, but even in such soil they do 

 cot always succeed. In some cases they resist strong 

 wind, while in others they are blown out of ex 



