38o 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[November i, 1882, 



that is what " W." does here. Taking it for granted 

 that his premises under his second head were unrefut- 

 able, he builds upon it his fourtli argument. There- 

 fore I refuse to false this he.'iding into consideration, 

 except noting what is said about " fungi preving upon 

 decaying organisms." What does Mr. Ward say ? He 

 Bays; — " jl'hf Jnngns injures the coffee by roNjing it of food 

 on the. inuimfadure of which a large expenditure of energy 

 has been employed, by occupying valuable space on the 

 leaves, and by producing profound disttirbances in the 

 functions of the plant." Here is enough of injury to 

 ruin the most vigorous of plants ; and yet "W." comes 

 witii his uoi ions about "decaying organisms." Every 

 practical man will refuse to allow such a term to be used 

 with regard to his once fruitful and s'ill comparatively 

 vigorous fields. Surely Mr. Ward has diignosed suffici- 

 ently on the disease and patient ; and he has shewn 

 us by the above remarks what a terrible thing it is 

 we have to do with, and yet " W." says " we blame 

 the Hemileia because it is tlie onlv one we can 

 see." There is no iloubt about the visibility of it 

 any m'-re thiiu there could be doubt of tlie illness, and 

 tbe cause of the illness, when we look on the emaci- 

 ated, powerless man, reduced to that state by ever- 

 recurring atacks of fever fed by the malaria. Are 

 we to act against our commonsense, and refuse to 

 reconcile what Mr. Ward tells us with what is visible 

 to our eyes? " W." argues thus ; — " Because we are 

 unable to know all the laws of nature — therefore we 

 are unable to conclude that Hemileia is the true 

 cause." So, because the doctor, who is called to the 

 fever-stricken patient, is unable to know all the laws 

 of nature as discovered hy medical scientific researches, 

 therefore he is not fitted to say whether malaria 

 causes the fever. 1 deny that there is anything in- 

 explicable in exceptional trees nnd spots being speci- 

 ally favoured, I do not see that the key to 

 the mystery lies in those sheltered nooiis, any more 

 than the key to the favourable conditions or re- 

 productive powers of the coflfee will be found swing- 

 ing on the stumps of a primary on a battered, shajje- 

 less coffee tree, standing on its tiptoes in cabooky 

 subsoil, and exposed not only to every wind that 

 blows, but every evil that may exist. Scientific men 

 tells us the disease came from the jungle. A man 

 of commonsense argues that as the fuel increases so 

 the power of the flaine ; therefore what was in itself 

 a compuratively harmless fungus, kept down to sm»ll 

 limits by limited food, yet blazed forth in steadily 

 increasing force, as a special i^laut, favourable to it 

 Bs a food, was extended over a large acreage. In his 

 second letter " W." still harps on the same strain, 

 seeking for the jH'i'rtmrf/ cause. He says: — " Coffee had 

 covered large areas of land for 30 years, surrounded by the 

 indegenous vegetation in which the fungus was all along 

 latent; but it so remained until stimulated into fearful 

 activity by some newly-acquired condition of the 

 trees." The spread of cholera in some large city 

 may be the result of neteorological conditions com- 

 bined with contagion brought by, perhaps, one in- 

 dividual ; but you cannot siy that contagion and 

 the disease is not the primary cause and only 

 favoured by climatic influences. "W." would have 

 us reverse this ; and this is the whole gist of his 

 argument. Also in some climates like that of 

 Colombo, cholera is not indigenous as on the coast ; 

 so, however often you brought the contagion, it 

 would expire as a flame in a lamp empty of oil. 

 Now here the conditions are prominent — they 

 resist the spread of the disease — whereas, in the 

 other case, they promote the same. In which of 

 the two are the conditions to be primarily con- 

 sidered? I take it in the one where i hey have most 

 power. If "W." was in search of the conditions as 

 favouring the spread and continuance of the disease, 

 I could follow him; but he insists on regarding the j 



conditious as the primary cause. Now I think 

 we have narrowed down the question to a point. 

 Leaf-disease has puralyzed and crippled the 

 coffee enterprize. Who has found a remedy ? I am 

 satisfied that a topical specific will yet be dis- 

 covered : but what about the present? The mouse gnaw- 

 ing at the rope has brought the whole structure about 

 our ears. Leaf-disease weakened our trees; the trees 

 could not bear; the planters got no returns; the 

 trees again suffered starvation and hardi-hips ; they 

 became still more unable to bear; planters became 

 still more unable to help tliem. These are co-relative 

 evils. Then irregularity of suitable weather ; fluctu- 

 ation and fall in market prices ; reckless speculation ; 

 haste iu extension and selection of new plantations ; 

 and undue forcing of the soil by artificial manure — 

 combine the latter evils with the former, and you 

 get stoppage of all manuring ; nearlyall pruning ; 

 cutting down of salaries to a point of bare exist- 

 ence ; and at the same spreading this underpaid 

 supervision over larger areas ; and so on, in all the 

 e.asy stages to abandonment and chaos — were it not 

 for neiit products. The Rip van Winkle of Ceylon has 

 wakened too late. Let us leave him trying to 

 account for changes apparent to every observant man, 

 and find a door of hope iu the watchw'ord of 

 planters, ne20 products. Sliould we wake up some 

 morning, to find Jiemikia gone, then it will be time 

 to renew our advances to our old love ; but at 

 present we have taken to ourselves other maidens 

 more comely and more responsive. Those men who 

 are leaving us may be induced again to return, if 

 we can otter them fruitful fields instead of barrenness. 

 Since writing the above, I have come across the 

 letter of " Fatnl Fungus" in your issue of the 2nd 

 instant, which bears ou the question in almost the 

 identical words I have used. I do not. look on this 

 merely as a coincidence, but as a proof that there 

 must be some reason in the arguments. 



AliERDONENSIS. 



MR. HOLLOWAY ON JAK TREES, &o. 



Maria, 7th Sept. 1882. 



Dear Sir, — I am surprized that your correspondent 

 " G. W." in reply to " P. T. L." sliould have statedthat 

 there are in Ceylon t^'o species of jak : one a surface 

 feeder and another a deep feeder ; whereas, in fact, 

 we have peni-war»ka, pol-waraka, han-wnraka, waraka, 

 pol-wela, diya-wela, meti-wela, kurii-kos, kurukos-wara- 

 ka, kurukos-wel aud hera-pila. The latter bears fruit 

 from the roots and is only found in Jaffna, I believe. 

 Kuru-kos is a small sweet fruit. The natives say it is 

 difficult to distinguish jak by the foliage : they judge 

 by the fruit. I have found some of all kiuds to be 

 surface feeders, but that need not alarm any one : 

 any shade tree, no matter of what species, which is 

 a surface feeder and does not allow coffee or other 

 products to grow near it, should have an 18 inch deep 

 and wide trench cut around it and all roots in that 

 trench cut out, when the adjoining trees will get as 

 vigorous as any other trees. 



I quite agree with "P. I. L." that, where jaks are 

 planted among coffee in land having a substratum of 

 rook, the former will thrive, if the wind does not 

 blow them down. So would all other shade trees thrive 

 and the coBte tree die out. I cannot hold with his 

 objection to the litter caused by the ever-dropping 

 leafes, simply because they fill up drains : cut 4 ft. 

 pits in your dr.ains every ;'0 or 100 yards, which will 

 catch your surface soil and leaves ; clear them out 

 whenever full : that soil is good for supj^ly or will 

 assist manuring. 



" P. T. L." w'ill find many of his murunga maram 

 also surface feeders and a mere nominal shade. He 

 will £ud Sooriah aud croton better. 



