November i, 1882.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



421 



State has in the working of experimental Farms, is 

 far greater than is represented by the sum it is pos- 

 sible 10 obtain by the sale of produce raised thereon ; 

 else, it would hf far better for the State to refrain 

 from engaging in such undertakings, and to seek 

 othir investments for the capital on which a mer- 

 cantile return is sought. Experimental farming is very 

 different from ordinary farming. The cost of the farm 

 might be reduced were the Commissariat slaughter- 

 yards, BO frequently complained of, closed and the 

 buildings made available to the farm, as was approved 

 of some years ago. We have shown, again ani again, 

 how reuuinurative dairy farming is here; but we 

 have been unable to undertake tliis branch of our 

 work, ehietly, because we do not feel justified in 

 keeping a number of valuable cows at the farm, ex- 

 posed, as they would be, to frequent attacks of dis- 

 ease brought by the sliiughter house cattle. From our 

 inability to engage in dairy farming and stock-rearing, 

 which would so specially suit our soils and circum- 

 stances, with the direct loss, by deaths, of stock during 

 the jcar, traceable to disease, which could have reached 

 the farm stock only through the medium of the Com- 

 mi!^sal•iat stock, our annual loss would represent a 

 sum quite equal to 30 per cent of the net annual cost 

 of the farm. However, as long as the objects of the 

 farm are, as at present, experimental aud educational, 

 its maintenance must necessarily involve some expense 

 to the State. 



Referring to these remarks the Board of revenue ob- 

 serve that in his report for the previous year Mr. 

 Henson stated that he proposed to set apart certain 

 fields on the northern side of the firm to be worked 

 as a commercial or model as distinguished from an 

 experimental farm. The present report does not show 

 that this intention has bern carried out, and the Board 

 again invite Mr. Robertson's attention to the matter, 

 repeating their opinion regarding the beneficial effect 

 upon ryots of demoustrating to them that our methods 

 of (arming are, from a financial point of view, better 

 than theirs. 



EXPORT OF COFFEE AND PEPPER FROM 

 THE WEST COAST OP INDIA. 



The table we publish ou page 427, includes, in the 

 case of coffee, nearly the whole of the exports from 

 Southern India, as but a small quantity goes from 

 Madras, and we suppose not much from Allepey, Tuti- 

 corin and Coimbatore. It ■will be observed that Messrs. 

 Alstons & Co. trace deterioration of the Mysore native 

 coffee to the introduction of Coorg plants. Why ? Our 

 experience in Ceylon seems to indicate that soil and 

 climate have more to do with the quality of coffee 

 than variety of plant (Liberiau coffee is a different 

 species). We could understand European planters in- 

 troducing plants from other districts, but the natives 

 of Mysore must be more reflective and enterprizing 

 than ours in Ceylon, if they voluntarily import plants 

 from other districts. That they should supersede 

 their own plants by others of an inferior class is, 

 however, beyond measure strange, and we should be 

 glad to have an explanation of the enigma pro- 

 pounded by Messrs. Alstons & Co. There is a dis- 

 tinction made in their figures between plantation and 

 native only in the case of some of the ports, and the 

 quantity of this kind seems insignificant. Looking 

 at the aggregate totals we find that the fluctuations 

 are such as might occur if leaf-disease had never 

 made its appearance. The West Coast season *nds 

 with June, three months earlier than the close of 

 ours, but the difference is not very material. The 

 question now is : Will there be a fail' average crop 



in the season which commenced on 1st July ? If 

 such should be the case, then it will be eviileut that 

 leaf-disease in Southern India has not told so dis- 

 astrously as iu Ceylon. And yet we have heard sad 

 tales of estates in Wynaad abandoned. Pepper, it 

 seems, is all native grown, but it is possible that the 

 culture may pay the few Europeans in Ceylon who 

 have taken it up, in view of the fact that warfare 

 in Achin seems to have revived and is likely to be 

 indefinitely protracted. The possession of the chief 

 pepper grounds in the world have cost and are 

 likely to cost our Dutch neighbours more lives 

 and money than they are worth. But presbige 

 has also to be sustained. Curiously enough, the 

 transaction between the British and Dutch (iovern- 

 meuts, by which, in exchange for a small Dutch 

 colony in Western Africa, we gave up the grand 

 island of Sumatra entirely to the Dutch, involved 

 both nations in little wars. Ours against Ashantee 

 was speedily concluded by the man who is now the 

 hero of Egypt. General after General, on the con- 

 trary, has returned with a shattered reputation from 

 the war in " Atjeh," as the Dutch call Achin. Governor 

 Loudon sent too small a force to begin with and an 

 officer, whom he censured for not doing what the 

 officer pleaded was impossible, got himself removed 

 from the Army "with honour," for the insubordin- 

 ation of refusing to take the hand which the Governor- 

 General extended to him on landing at Batavia. He 

 gave a formal military salute instead aud got shelved. 

 Such are the consequences due to pepper and the 

 mental idioayncracy to which the spice gives the 

 name of "peppery !" 



THE ALOE FIBRE ENTERPRIZE IN 

 MAURITIUS. 



Through the medium of a Natal paper, containing 

 report of the proceedings of the Victoria Planters' 

 Association, we are, at length, in possession of dis 

 tinct information as to the species of aloe from which 

 the planters of Mauritius obtain the fibre which they 

 sell as a rival to hemp. It is the gi-een aloe, 

 Fourcroya (I'lgantea, so well-known iu Ceylon, especi- 

 ally as a hedge plant for coffee estates exposed to 

 cattle trespass. We have not, to our recollection, 

 before seen the alternative name, ar/ai-e fatida by 

 which it seems to be known iu Mauritius. The in- 

 dustry in that island — the aloes being probably gi-own 

 on exhausted sugar land — must have assumed con- 

 siderable importance from the fact that a M. Evenor 

 de Chazal has published an elaborate book on the 

 subject, giving sketches of the machinery employed. 

 This, we regi-et to observe, is elaborate and expensive, 

 costing from £1,000 to £1,200, apart from the neces- 

 sary buildings which would, probably, double the 

 amount. A brother of M. de Chazal, who resides in 

 Natal, thus describes the machinery used in Mauritius: — 



A small mill able to do half a ton of fibre would 

 contain the following machinery : — 1. One boiler of 

 30-horse power. 2. One engine of 18-horse power ; 

 3. Si.x apparatus to card, commonly called scrapers . 

 the whole of which would amount, in Mauritius, to 

 £1,000 or £1,'200 sterling. According to the produce 

 established above, this mill could manufacture daily 

 33 tons of aloe leaves. 



The machinery being so costly* aud it being certain 

 that even if a considerable space could be at once 



* At the same time, no doubt there are steam engines 

 in the country at present comparatively idle, which would 

 be available.— Kd. 



