498 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[December i, 1884. 



in question belonged. Ir perfectly ripe fruits of the 

 " Cuudeamar " cacao, the flesh of the rind remains 

 quite green. 



Mr. Holloway may not have beeu aware of this ; 

 if so, the fact ehould have led him to be more care- 

 ful iu his criticisms. A I otanist is little likely to 

 under-estimate the importance of ripe seed. It would 

 however require a good deal mure evidmee than we 

 possess at present to prove that it is their origin 

 from immature seed th it is the cause of the death 

 of healthy joung plants. lndeid my experience in 

 Ceylou ha? si. own me that many failures are set 

 down to "unripe S' ed " which are clearly clue to 

 quite different causi s. 



One thing more. In his evident desire to find 

 something 10 say against the Administration of the 

 Government Gardens, Mr. Holloway repeats some 

 story he has heard, apparently with the object 

 of founding on it a charge that natives are favoured 

 in this matter of cacao-pods at the expense of Eur- 

 opean planters Nothing can be further from the truth. 

 So far as the small stock o, pods at my disposal 

 allows me to do so (a tirst crop on some 30 trees 

 only now ripening), I endeavour to satisfy all applic- 

 ations and to act impartially in the distribution. Very 

 nearly all the planters who have applied hive now 

 been supplied with a small number each. It cannot 

 be necessary for me to justify my action in also 

 disposing of some to native cultivators, aud I shall 

 certainly not do so at the request of so prejudiced 

 and inaccurate a critic as Mr. Holloway has shown 

 himself to be. So far as I am concerned, this con- 

 troversy is now closed.* — I am, sir, your obedient 

 servant, HENRY TEIMEN, Director R. B. G. 



CEYLON FIBRES. 

 Kadianlena Estate, Kotmale, 26th Nov. 1884. 



Deak Sir, — -I send you a small quantity of fibre 

 {Hibiscus senaBosa) and would be much obliged if you 

 could let me know its approximate value if properly 

 cured. There was no care taken in curing this : the 

 branches were merely pitched into the water and kept 

 there till the fibre came away freely ; then washed and 

 dried.— Yours faithfully, JAMES GRAY. 



[The sample is a good one though roughly pre- 

 pared, and is worth probably .£20 to £25 per ton ; 

 what is the plant — not the shoeflower, " Hibiscus 

 Rosa sinensis "? — Ed.] 



Cost of Timber at the Straits. — On all sides I hear 

 complaints of the high prices of planks, &c., at the Johore 

 Steam Saw Mills. They say the Company send over their 

 test planks to their depot in Singapore, where they dispose 

 of them at cheaper rates. It is evident that these 

 complaints are not altogether groundless ; for out 

 of every hundred ordinary half-inch boards for which 

 S6 is charged here and only §5 in Singapore — at the 

 most only 60 or 70 pieces are good for anything. 

 Purchasers are not allowed to select their planks 

 here, but have that privilege at the above-named depot, 

 or, which amounts to the same thing, the materials 

 in the latter place are already selected for them. This 

 appears anomalous, and Johore customers should have 

 some explanation from the manager to silence their com- 

 plaints. Good wood is certainly more difficult to obtain now 

 than in former days, but this is no reason for the high 

 prices charged ; for the system of advancing money to 

 wood-cutters remain the same, and I am told the Company 

 do not pay much more for timber now than the Mills did 

 in the old days of Taujong Putri, and the little they lose 

 under this bead is coinmeusurably made up for by a more 

 •areful method of selecting their timber and a judicious 

 bargaining over rejected portions of " rafts." I notice a 

 gentleman here, who is about to build a house, has been 

 forced by high prices and low quality to get his planks, &c, 

 from Singapore brought over in tongkaugs. This should not 

 be so. — Singapore Free Press. 



* And we think further discussion on the subject can 

 ^erve no good purpose. — Ed. 



CINCHONA CULTIVATION : 



Report on thf Government Cinchona Enterpeize in 



Java fob the Third Quarter 1884. 



(Translated for the " Ceylon Observer." J 

 The past quarter was on the whole very dry. At the 

 end of August several refreshing showers fell, while in 

 the latter half of September also some rainy days were 

 recorded. At thfc end of July and the beginning of Sept- 

 ember night frosts were experienced, which did pretty 

 considerable damage to the open nurseries at Tjibeureum 

 and to the plants at Rivenggoeuoeng and Kuwah Tjinvidei. 

 On the last-mentioned estate a considerable extent of 

 four-year old succirub-as was entirely destroyed. On July 

 19th the smaller half of the outturn of the harvest of 



1883 was sold by public auction at Amsterdam. The 

 prices paid were on the whole very satisfactory, though 

 Jess than those of the previous year. Slivers ot original 

 Ledgerianas realized as much aa /3*92 per half kdogram, 

 but dust of hybrids — descendants of Ledgerianas — also 

 brought from /l to /T65 per half kilo. The prices paid 

 for pharmaceutical barks packed in boxes deserve remark. 

 Whilst quills 05 meter in length, packed in jute bales, 

 could get a maximum of only /1'91, for quills of the same 

 length packed in boxes as much as /302 per half kilo 

 was paid. The total return was /201,977'115 gross, or 

 /T045 per half kilo. The harvest of this year amounted 

 'to about 250,000 Amst. lb. Of this 204,369 lb were last 

 September sent to Batavia, whilst 2,263 lb were reserved 

 for the military medical service of the island. The harvest 

 for the last few months consisted for the most part of 

 slivers of Ledgeriana descendants, whilst from among the 

 old Calisaya and Josephina gardens only sickly aud stunted 

 trees were croppeu. It was at first the intention, to dig 

 up on a large scale in the course of this year plantations 

 of inferior varieties and utilize them for the growth of 

 Ledgeriana and succirubra, but the demand for 

 pharmaceutical barks of handsome appearance shown by 

 several sales, has proved the value of these Calisaya aud 

 Josephiana plantations, and the uprooting of these gardens 

 will therefore be delayed as long as possible. The outturn of 



1884 does not promise to be so large as that of 18S3, but 

 it may be expected that the return from the product 

 gathered and yet to be gathered will, by the large quan- 

 tities of Ledgeriana slivers aud the considerable amount 

 of pharmaceutical barks packed in boxes, in spite of a 

 possible large fall in cinchona prices, yield a profit at least 

 equal to that from the outturn of 1883. The supply of 

 labor was scarce only at the beginning of the past quarter. 

 Good use was made of the available forces, so far as funds 

 permitted, for deep working of the soil, the results of 

 which were so plainly manifested shortly after the setting 

 in of the dry season, but especially after some slight 

 showers of rain in the latter half of September. By the 

 continual hunting of the Helopeltis Antonii the ravages 

 caused by this insect were reduced to a minimum, and the 

 damages resulting therefrom is consequently of little 

 moment. On Julv 4th and September 4th sales of cinchona 

 seed were held. The tirst sale brought /3.010, the latter 

 /'1,542. In July Hr. A. A. Maas Geesteranus was honor- 

 ably relieved from further acting in the office of Assistant 

 Director of the Government Cinchona Enterprize, and the 

 2nd class Military Apothecary P. Van Leersum was definitely 

 appoii-ted to the office. 



VAN ROMONDE, 

 Director, Government Cinchona Enterprise. 

 Bandoeng, 17th Oct. 1884. 



CEYLON UPCOUNTRY PLANTING REPORT. 



CETI.ON TEA PRICES — SALES OF ESTATES — PRIVATE AND CROWN 

 LANOS — ESTIMATES OF TEA HOUSE AND MACHINERY — TEA 

 ESTIMATES. 



22nd November, 1884. 

 The prices which our teas are realizing in the Lon- 

 don market are so very encouraging that it is hardly 

 to be wondeied at that we hear little else than tea 

 talked. Everybody is becoming au authority more 

 or less and tea tasters are as common as house flies. 

 Just offer a cup of tea to a visitor, and he is caught 

 at once. If he be not critical he is nothing, and, if 



