982 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[Tune i, 1883. 



avoided, and should never be used, if possible. Mangoe 

 or aum has a strung resiuous smell, and should, wo 

 tbink, be used with caution until the fact has been 

 well established by carefully conducted experiments, 

 whether it really injures the tea or not. It is only 

 within the last few years that it has been introduced 

 to any extent, and we must not forget that it was 

 durinf; tlv same period that the deteoriatiou in the 

 etayiug powers of our tea has been complained of. 

 It would be worth the while of some of our planters 

 to keep a chest for a year or so, and report the re- 

 sult. Koorba and Sotroug have been in use mnuy 

 years, and we have never heard any complaints beyond 

 the fact that they were not so durable as some of 

 the hard r woods ; and that more breakages were 

 reported on arrival in Calcutta than amongst the 

 others. Jalna and tsak are both hard woods, but the 

 great drawback to their use is their very heavy weight 

 which makes them undesirable, Fspecially in the oase of 

 gardens which have much land carriage. Toon or 

 oooma wood is, we believe, used iu Darjeeling. This 

 should be a good tough wood as well as being light, 

 and could be made up into very neat looking packages. 

 Mr. Sibthorpe when d')wn in Australia, and when in 

 America, several times noted tliat there was great room 

 for improvement in the matter of boxes ; and his com- 

 parison with the China boxes was anything but favour- 

 able. In Calcutta for furniture the oooma or toon 

 wood is in much request, and we see no reason, if 

 this is a suitable wood for tea-boxes, why for a very 

 small extra outlay s really respectalile box oould not 

 be turned out. Let our planters once take the thing 

 in hand, it will be done. At the present moment 

 there ia probably no more clumsy, unwieldy looking 

 thing than an Assam tea chest ; and the rough ex- 

 terior is, we doubt not, much against its takmg iu a 

 new market. A very small progressive move in this 

 respect has been made by one firm in Calcutta in 

 decorated tea-boxea ; but the price is prohibitive to 

 any large consamption. We fail to see why our brethren 

 in Assam abould not be equal to the occasion and 

 get up nice packages, trim and neat, and ht to put 

 »long.»ide of tbe Chinese. We feel sure that the in- 

 domitable British spirit of enterprise has only to be 

 properly aroused to get it done. If J inch thick wood 

 is enough to keep together China tea, why is it not 

 enough for Indian ? These are points which every 

 planter should think over and endeavour to improve, 

 as every little, helps in the struggle now going on for 

 oxitenoe. 



[To the above article from the Iiyiigo Planters' 

 Oatette we would add our already often repeated hope 

 that erelong paper may supersede wood as material for 

 tea boxes. Subjooted to the tremendous pressure which 

 proper machinery can effect, paper ought to have all 

 the solidity of wood of the same thickness, say J inch. 

 and ought to be equally oap,ible of being dove-tailed 

 and bored lor nails. The material could be sent out 

 in flhooks of pieces ready prepared or in sheet e to be 

 cut to different sizes. Ultimately the cost of carriage 

 might be saved by the manufacture of papier-mach6, 

 properly varnished in India and why not in Ceylon ? 

 Has any experiment in this direction been made ? — 

 Ed.] 



THE CINCHONA ENTERPRIZE : SUPPLY 



AND DEMAND. 

 We quote from the Madras Times a letter from a 

 South-Eaat Wynaad planter who re-sings a song which 

 has already been repeatedly chanted, the burden of 

 which is that cinchona culture iu the east and west 

 is being overdone, and that the sujiply will erelong 

 exceed the demand. There is, no doubt, much truth 

 in the warning notes, and the wretchedly uni°emunerative 



rates at which twig bark has recently sold add force 

 to the arguments used. In talking of the hundreds of 

 thousands of trees planted iu India, Ceylon, Java, 

 Jamaica and (fther places, we must not forget our ex- 

 perience here in Ceylon of the enormous proportion 

 which "dies off'' or "cankers" before coming to 

 maturity. There is also no doubt that, in the case 

 of quinine and the other fever-curing alkaloids, there 

 is, beyond most articles of human use, scope for ex- 

 tended consumption. The only limit, indeed, is that 

 of cost, and what has happened and is happening in 

 the case of coffee and tea will certainly happen in 

 regard to cinchona bark : low prices will encourage 

 consumption and demand will continue even in the 

 face of higher prices. There is wisdom in the advice 

 given to cultivate only the best kinds, but with this 

 qualification, that robust trees, such as succirubra, 

 the renewed bark of which seems to improve with 

 every shaving, may prove to be ultimately the best. 



OoCHiNEAL. — Cochineal is the body of the female cochineal 

 insect dried. This insect exists on a species of cactus, and 

 when ahve is about the size of a ladybird, or perhaps a trifle 

 smaller. It is wingless, rather long, equally broad all over, 

 and is marked behind with deep incisions and wrinkles. It 

 has sis feet, which curiously enough are only of use directly 

 after birth, tmd it secures itself to the plant by means of a 

 trunk which is found between the fore feet, and derives its 

 nourishmeut from the sap. The male cochineal is. like the 

 female only during the larva period. It changes into 

 chrysalis, and eventually appears as red fUes. The female 

 deposits some thousands of eggs which she protects under 

 her body until they are hatched, and on the appearance of 

 the young ones the parent dies. While the young are in the 

 larva state their sex cannot be determined. They lose their 

 skins several tunes, and while the female fixes herself on the 

 plant, the male, after getting over the pupa state, is winged. 

 Two or three months is the extent of the life of tliese little 

 insects. They are gathered before they lay eggs, and are 

 then rich in colouring matter. About 70,000 insects are said 

 to go to the pound of cochineal. — Exjxirt frices Current ^ 

 Trade Report. 



Pioneering with New PRODtrcxa.— A capitalist 

 interested in Ceylon writes : — " Many people now 

 disbelieve in rubber cultivation ever being made 

 a paying investment in Ceylon. Had Ceylon been 

 blessed with Governors of sense we would years ago 

 have had demonstrated to us, iu different localities 

 in the island, which new products could be made to 

 pay. No man cares to become a pioneer in new pro- 

 ducts, be he ever so wealthy. When the C-;o\ernmont 

 authority, the Director of Ceylon Botanical Gardens, 

 gave it as his opinion that the days of coffee were 

 numbered, it must have been the manifest duty of Go- 

 vernment to set about to demonstrate the capabilities 

 of tlie island for new products at various elevations. 

 Had this been done, the exports today of these new 

 products would almost have equalled in \alue those 

 of old King Coffee in his prime. As in the case of 

 Samson, now that the main pillars have gone, all 

 (even Government officials) with all the coliee (Sam- 

 son) perish (or nearly so) in the one catastrophe. 

 But this talk of ."perishing" is nonsense: coffee 

 is not yet dead, old Sol is in an erratic mood and 

 playing truant with good seasons. Coffee will yet 

 pay magnificently."— Our correspondent must remem- 

 ber that Governor C-!regory most energetically and 

 personally interested himself in " New Iroducts." 

 In his time, "cinchona," "tea," '■cocoa," ''rubber," 

 were honoUl'ed withs pecial headings and paragraphs 

 in the annual Address, and, in order to give reliable 

 information for the benefit of absentees who pay 

 great attention to what a Governor says, Sir Willian> 

 visited every district where experiments were carried 

 on. It was part of Ills policy, too, to establish Ex- 

 perimental Gardens for new and old products iu 

 every province iu the island. 



