

;THE TE0PX6AL AGRICULTURIST, 



[Juke >,- 1885. 



The potatoes, carrots, Bellary onions, squashes, dillseed. 

 Japan, French and broad beans, BuppUed to the market 

 gard aers, rotted away in most taluks from the same cause, 

 and partly from want of care, but they succeeded fairly 

 in others. Their cultivation was introduced from Hassan, 

 where they were first raised several years ago from seed 

 distributed by the present Commissioner of Ooorg. 



Tobacco seed from Dindigul and Ooimbatore, of the 

 variety from which Trichinopoly cheroots are made, suc- 

 ceeded Ul the Naujarajpatna and Yelsa\ irsbime taluks. 



A good variety of ginger introduced from Shernad in 

 Malabar is thriving wed iu most taluks. The introduc- 

 tion of the pepper vine from Malabar proved a failure 

 from the cuttings having r ifcted in transit. 



For the first time for several years past, tho planter 

 experienced great difficulty in procuring a sufficiency of 

 labor for plantation work. The Mysore coolies were late in 

 coming in, and, when the batches did arrive, they were 

 less than half the number for whom advances had been 

 made. The causes assigned were the abundance of the 

 crops which had caused a fall ill prices of food grains, and 

 the demand for labour on the Bangalore-Tumkoor line of 

 Railway which was under construction. Some of the estates 

 suffered from tho weeds not having been removed in time, 

 while in other cases the managers and proprietors were and 

 from heavy loss only by the strenuous efforts which they 

 made to import labour from the Tamil country near Salem, 

 and by employing the costly but valuable labour from the 

 Western Coast. ' Owing probably, to questions affecting 

 the tenure of land in Malabar, the numbers of coolies, 

 chiefly Moplas, who were attracted from that part of the 

 country, were unusually large, and with their aid the difficulty 

 of securing the crop was tided over. Many of the Tamil 

 coolies, who were imported, failed to give satisfaction, but 

 others have clone well, and their advent to the country is 

 welcomed, the more so as many of them are willing to ODgage 

 without advances. The Mupla labourers proved also most 

 useful in doing good work on petty contract on the roads. 



To compensate, as it -wore, for tho losses in tho previous 

 years, the number of deaths among cattle was comparat- 

 ively light, being 2,668 head against 14,347 in 1882-83; 

 and this notwithstanding that the rainfall was fully up to 

 the average. Evidently, nearly all the weakly cattle had 

 succumbed to the heavy monsoon of tho year before. 



No greater blow has been dealt for many years past to 

 the prosperity of Coorg, and to the coffee interest, to 

 which it owes its nourishing condition, than the heavy fall 

 in the maiket price, which took place at the close of the 

 season. It has decreased from K40 to R2o the cwt. within 

 the last two years, and in the homo market from 100 

 shillings to 01 shillings, or 40 per cent. The cause is 

 attributable to tho overstocked condition of the Loudon 

 market. The Times' in a recent issue describes the stock 

 as apparently inexhaustible, and states that it is not known 

 to how low prices may still fall. Ceylon and Coorg have 

 to compete with Brazil where there is slavo labour, and 

 where fresh land is said to be abundant. The extension 

 of railway communications iu Brazil is another advantage 

 iu favor of that country, and in recent years the planters 

 there have be en taught by settlers from Ceylon the proper 

 mauner of curing and preparing coffee, so that Brazil 

 coffee has lately obtained in the home market as good a 

 price as that of Coorg. The native coffee is chiefly in 

 request for the French market, to which quantities have 

 been exported direct from the Western Coast. 



Owing to the good crops reaped in Mysore, the prices 

 of food grains showed a tendency to fall still lower. Rice, 

 the staple crop of Coorg, fell to Hl-12-0 the maund of 

 80 lb., ".•" annas 12 less than in the previoui year, and 

 , : ,,.i i,, Rl-2-0 or annass 5 less. The market was so dull 

 -,l the end of the harvest in the Yelsavirsbime. taluk, that 

 sales could not be effected for some time. The ryots 

 acknowledged the liberality of Government iu giving them 

 time to effect a sale by the receut alteration iu the pay- 

 ment of instalments of revenue. 



'lhe rain-fall during the year was slightly abovo the 



Inches, Cents. 

 Xba1 ' Hn ftlefcars being ... I 10 '"' 



in South floo] i 



n K;r I I loOrg ... 14 33 



on the Western Chauts Jo'J 79 



The season opened very [favorably for all agricultural 

 operations. The timely blossom showers led to fine crops of 

 coffee and cardamoms being picked. The subsequent rains 

 ensured the safety of tho rice crop, which was fully up to 

 the average, but in Eastern Coorg serious damage was 

 done by the heavy rains to the ragi and Bengal gram 

 crops, especially by two unexpected downpours, which took 

 place iu the month of December. These showers caused 

 also some damage to tho coffee crop when drying on the 

 barbacues, and to the rice crop iu South Ooorg. — Indian 

 Agriculturist. 



■ •* 



MAURITIUS ACCLIMATION SOCIETY. 



Meeting of Friday, 27th March 1SS5. 



A communication from Mr. P. Leinicro was read on 

 the Jarrah tree of Australia. 



The President announced that he had received a 

 letter from Professor lleokel, of the faculty of medicine 

 and science and Virccleur du Jardin de Marsuille, who 

 had just terminated an important work on the Kola, 

 a tree which contains a very large proportion of 

 Cafeine. In his last letter, he aunouuees that he will 

 send the Society a lot of fresh seeds of the Kola, 

 which was a tree destined to render great servioe to 

 the colony. 



The President spoke of the Doundake, Sarcocephalus 

 esculantius, a tree which is common ou the West 

 coast of Africa and has febrifuge properties equal or 

 superior to that of Peruvian bark ; also of a great 

 Cdt'ee tree, native of Mayotte and the Comoro 

 islands, which produces excelleut small grained coffee. 

 Some seeds had already been sent to Mr. Potier, 

 the Directeur du Jardin Botanique at Reunion ; also 

 Cassia seeds which produce astonishing results as a 

 febrifuge, but which were nothing else than Casse- 

 puante ; the letter said they were much more effective 

 than Peruvian bark. The whole of the plant was 

 febrifuge, except the root which was diuretic. He 

 found in the transactions of the Royal Society for 

 1805 that the Gafi d' Afrique had been recognized 

 to be cassepuante. 



The President called the attention of the members 

 to the cultivation of the IlliptS, a tree which grows 

 very well in Mauritius. This tree furnishes the 

 soap received from the Coromandel Coast. Its seeds 

 furnish a kind of oil or rather butter. The blossoms 

 which appear in December and January contain 

 GO per cent of sugar. In India a great deal of alcohol 

 is made from them. In France the flowers are mixed 

 with the grapes in the manufacture of wine. Each 

 tree produces 400 lb. of flowers, which are worth 

 250 francs a ton at Marseilles. JP 



The President called attention to the culture of 

 the Ylang Ylaug ; he had planted a cutting 8 inches 

 long which bore flowers in one year, the flower has 

 a strong perfume aud resembles champac, or the 

 floweis of the cceur-de-boeuf. The flowers were worth 

 750 francs the kilo. [Credat /—Ed.] 



The President remarked that Mauritius produced a 

 great many useful flowers which were lost. It was • 

 very easy to make essence of geranium by steeping 

 the leaves in water, aud then distilling it, the 

 essence which was lighter than the water was easily 

 distilled. 



The President announced that ho had received from 

 Mr. Pelte for Mr. Lienard some Copal plants. 



A d.stribution was made of Malta orange trees. 



Fiure Extraction. — A Dutch artisan named Plaisicr 

 claims to have invented a hand-machine for fibre 

 extraction. It separates all the woody parts and 

 leaves from green lameh, and turns out the fibres 

 clean without damage and free from gum. The samples 

 of fibre produced by the machine are said to have been 

 reported upon favourably. — Pioneer, 



