November i, 1884.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



379 



the former occupants of portions of Ceylon,— the 

 Portuguese and Dutch,— are facts that surely go to 

 the composition of a striking chapter in " the 

 Romance of Commerce." We suppose many of us oe. 

 casionally experience a fear that the earth's stores of fuel 

 for man's use may give oat. But if coal, the result 

 of carbonized vegetable matter, becomes scarce, _ we 

 have the products of fossil eorj) iusects and tithes 

 to fall back upon ; and should the.-e also be exhausted, 

 we may feel assured that other compens iting dis- 

 coveries will be made. 



INCREASING PRODUCTION OF CINCHONA 

 BARK AND CHEAP QUININE: 



FORTNIGHTLY AND HALF-YEARLY AVERAGE PRICES OF 



QUININE FOR 16 YEARS. THE NEED OF EXTENDING 



THE FSE OK CINCHONA ALKALOIDS. 



Among several inquiries induced by our letter on 

 ' ' The Planting Industries of Ceylon " in the London 

 Times of the 26th August, there was one from a 

 leading City firm in reference to Cinchona which 

 led to a consultation as to the best means of making 

 known the present exceptionally moderate price of 

 quinine and the best mode of promoting an advance in 

 consumption. At our request, a table showing the 

 prices of quinine at the fortnightly sales in London 

 for the past sixteen years was drawn up, but it did 

 not reach us till the eve of embarkation. From 

 Suez however we were enabled to send back a state, 

 ment and appeal addressed to the London press with 

 a summary of the figures which we give in full, on 

 page 380, for the benefit of Ceylon planters and others 

 interested in the important cinchona industry. The 

 table of prices which has been prepared by a reliable 

 authority shows that between 1S6S and August last, 

 the price of the most valuable of all febrifuges and 

 tonics— Quinine — has never been so low as at the 

 present time. This, of course, is partly owing to 

 a temporary unsettlement of the market through the 

 recent failure of the proprietors of the Milan Factory ; 

 but it is also undoubtedly due to the largely-increasing 

 export of the raw product cinchona bark, from the 

 East : — India Java, but more especially from Ceylon. 

 The information we received some months ago in Hem 

 York and Philadelphia from the leading Houses, one 

 of which had a direct interest in a planting venture 

 in Colombia, went to show that the South American 

 cinchoua bark is not likely to compete successfully 

 any longer with the Eastern supplies to the London 

 market. The margin for the profitable collection of 

 natural bark is more than exhausted by the great 

 fall in price, while several attempts at cultivation 

 under American, German or local auspices did 

 not give such promise of success as to encourage the ex- 

 tension of, or in some cases, perseverance with, the area 

 already cleared and planted. A most striking testi- 

 mony to the importance of our Eastern Industry is 

 found in the fact that when the Guatemala Govern- 

 ment recently desired to introduce cinchona cultivation 

 in their hill districts, the President commissioned 

 a Ceylon planter, then passing through the country, 

 to proceed to the East Indies, procure a supply of the 

 best seed and with that to commence an experimental 

 plantation. 



The English and Dutch Governments may well be 

 congratulated on the rapid development of an in- 

 dustry which was originated entirely through offic- 

 ial influence aud in a very limited, inexpensive way, 

 less than 25 years ago. To Mr. Clements Markham, 

 above all others, is credit due for the introduction 

 of cinchona cultivation into India, but the local 



; Governments there as well as in Ceylon were fortun- 

 ate in having agents so intelligent and earnest 

 in carrying out the work as the late Mr. 

 Mclvor of the Nilgiris, Dr. King of Calcutta, 

 Mr. Gammie of Sikkim (who besides cultivating 

 plantations is manufacturing alkaloids from the bark 

 for Government), and in Ceylon the late Dr. Thwaitcs 

 and his successor Dr Trimeu of the Botanic Gardens 

 These gentlemen were encouraged at every turn by 



I Sir Joseph Hooker and Mr. Thiselton Dyer of Kew ; 

 but we need scarcely say that they had great ditfic 

 ulty in persuading private planters to cultivate 

 cinchonas — " medicine ' — plants until the personal 

 inrlu nee of Governor Sir William Gregory, between 

 1872-77, and the rapidly spreading blight in their 

 coffee, forced plantation owners to turn their atten- 

 tion to "New Prod :cts." In Java the Dutch Gov- 

 ernment has been ad nirably served by Messrs. 

 Moeus and Van Romunde in charge of the cinchona 

 gardens where most important work has been done 

 in experimental cultivation and in the ha vesting of 

 the bark. 



Briefly the result as regards the cultivation of 

 plantations and the production of cinchona hark in 



I the east may be summed up as follows : — 



India began with an export of 26 992 lb. of haik in 

 1875 6. It rose to an export of 641,608 1b. in 1882-3 

 of which 400,000 lb. are reckoned from plantations in 

 private hands. This is besides 350,000 lb. of bark us j d 

 for the local manufacture of alkaloids in Bengal by the 

 Government. 



Java gave a crop of 200,000 lb. bark in 187S 

 and rose to an export of 904 9701b. in 18S2 (from 

 Government plantations 506,00 J lb and from private 

 cultivation 398,970 lb.) 



Ceylon began with an export of 28 ounces iu 1S69 



and rose to an export of 6,925.595 lb. in season 



1882-3 ; while for season 1883 4 a total export of about 



Hi million lb. has been leached I 



The area in cultivation may be given as follows : — 



[of trees. 



India: Govt. plantations 

 Do. Private ,, 



Java (both) ,, 



Ceylon (all private) ,, 



Straits Settlements, 

 Burniah, Borneo, 

 North Australia, Ac. ) 

 The annual harvest 



ations 'was, last year, 



300 acres with 6J million 



500 



1 



f bark from ihese plant- 

 estimated roughly at 8h 

 million 11) with the prospect of a steady rise. 

 according as the demand afforded encouragement and 

 the South American supply diminished ; but seeing that 

 Ceylon alone has given 11^ millions pounds of 

 bark this season, the Eastern supply is already- 

 far outstripping the estimates. At the same time it 

 is almost cert lin that, owing to the collapse of the 

 Oriental Bank and the scarcity of capital, the Ceylon 

 planters have been forced this year to strip off more 

 of their bark than otherwise they would have done, 

 so that the current season's shipments should show a 

 considerable reduction on the export for 1 883-8 i. 



Though with a less area under cultivation than in 

 India and Ceylon, Java is supposed to have richer 

 bark, having a larger proportion of the valuable 

 Lsdgeriana trees growing on plantations. But this 

 kind has also been freely planted in India and in 

 Ceylon where every possible experiment in cultiv 

 ation and harvesting cinchona bark, is being tried 

 iu order to discover the best mode of treating the 

 trees. There is, we need scarcely say, a very great 

 deal to learn yet as to the soil, climate mode of 

 cultivation and treatment, calculated to give the 

 beat results. 



Hitherto in many cases where the least attention 

 has been bestowed by planters on their trees, the 



