214 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. tSsPTEMBER l, 1885, 



In a later issue of the 3IaU appears the following 

 letter : — , . , , li 



Sir,— I have been much interested m several letters 

 on this most serious question to us Planters, published 

 in your paper. I have perused all most carefully, and 

 there is no doubt a good deal in all the opinions given. 

 Cherry picked at an insufficient stage of ripeness, kept 

 too long and allowed to heat before pulping, and allow- 

 ing parchment almost dry to get wet again, are, I am 

 almost convinced, the chief causes of bad colour. In 

 some districts it is almost impossible to keep your 

 coffee once nearly dry,— for you cannot store insufficiently 

 dried parchment,— and owing to continued wet weather, 

 however nicely covered with matting on the barbacues, 

 rain will get through. Besides, it is very injimous to 

 cover up half dry stuff like this. This could be re- 

 medied by having some barbacues built under rather 

 lofty sheds, open all round, for drying parchment that 

 has had the water fairly dried off in the open. A 

 better plan would be to have "Pucka" tables on rails, 

 that could be run in under the sheds in case of ram; 

 and the extra cost would pay in the better colour of 

 the beau. Now as to picking half ripe cherry. The 

 natives in 'Wynaad never pick their coffee till it _ is 

 quite purple, and almost tumbling off ; they then "strip 

 everything at once ; they do pick some greeen berries 

 then, but these are either fully matured, if not, a very 

 small percentage not worth reckoning, and I have in- 

 variably noticed that their cherry, when pounded out 

 into clean coffee, seems to have a far superior color 

 to our parchment coffee when pounded out. Every native 

 will tell you their 'purpu' (clean) coffee has a better 

 color than ours, for we pick half ripe coffee. Fully 

 ripe cherry pulps easily ; a far less percentage ' cut,' 

 ferments much quicker for washing, and turns out a 

 fine sample of parchment. 



25th July. COOBOOMEER. 



In the Mail of August 4th a correspondent criticizes 

 Mr. Quarme, and gives his own ideas as follows: — 



Sir,— What shall he say who cometh after the irre- 

 pressible Mr. Qurame ! I can only leave him to the 

 tender mercies of my Wynaad brethren, whilst faintly 

 breathing the hope that the latter gentlemen will not t'ail 

 to " make a note of it," and henceforth refrain from 

 picking their crops by bushels instead of by tons. It is 

 to be hoped that Mr. Quarme is prepared to shew those 

 reprehensible, supine Wynaad planters where those same 

 tons are going to come from ! The question under dis- 

 cussion, I believe, is: "What is the deterioration in 

 fiuality of Wynaad grown coffee ? " I refrain from answer- 

 ing, Sir, because I believe, those most mterested are sick 

 of theories, and the most elabroate statment of my posi- 

 tion on this point would be met with the impatient reply : 

 '• Theory, Sir, mere theory ; we have got no money to 

 throw away on expensive theories." For this reason I 

 beg to be excused from expressing my views, trustworthy 

 and well-grounded though I know them to be. Perhaps, 

 however, I might just venture to hazard the suggestion 

 of an heroic measure that will make my Wynaad brethren's 

 hair stand on end. Provided A. B. has still a decent 

 soil to work on, but which, alas! can only show coffee 

 bushes unable to mature their crop (or do anythmg 

 decent for that matter), let him pick out the poorest 

 bushes, carefully train the best sucker that the bush is 

 capable of, from as low down as possible, and then stump 

 the bush. In order to avoid all possibility of being charged 

 with theorizing, let me here fall back upon well-proved 

 facts, which will, however, bear recapitulation. What are 

 some' of the chief advantages derived from shade ? 



Firstly. The foliage of coffee-bushes under shade is 



generally of a healthy, dark green colour, and altogether 

 fit to discharge its important function healthily. 



Secondly.— The soil under shade does not get ■ caked in 

 the hot season, and hence remains permeable to the fertiliz- 

 ing influence of light and air. 



Thirdly.— Under shade the farmation of nitrates does 

 not proceed with such wasteful rapidity as in the open, 

 and consequently the fertilizing elements of the soil are 

 better conserved. 



Fourthly. — Unless the shade tree be a surface feeder 

 its roots bring up stores of fertilizing matter which the 

 feeding rootlets of the|coffee bush cannot reach, and the said 

 coffee bush ultimately benefits on the deposit of fallen leaves. 



These are only a few out of the numerous advantages 

 to be derived from shade. In conclusion, I may quote 

 an extract from " Engineering " which looks suspiciously 

 like theory: — 



" Recent researches by M. Slaumen^ have shewn that 

 the metal manganese exists in various growths as a salt 

 of an organic acid. The proportion in cacao is very great, 

 as it is in coffee, tobacco, and especially in tea. In the 

 fifty grammes of ashes left by a kilogramme of tea, there 

 were found five grammes of metallic manganese. There 

 are plants, however, in which no manganese is found, 

 such as oranges, lemons, onions, &c. Many medicinal 

 plants contain it, as for example, cinchona, white mustard 

 and the lichen (Rocella tinctoria). Tea, coffee and other 

 plants require an abundance of manganese in the soil for 

 their proper cultivation, and the absence of it may account 

 for the failure of many plantations." 



Perhaps Mr. Hughes, of Oeylon fame, will kindly en- 

 Ughten us further on the point, and Mr. M. :A. Lawson 

 will also take up the tale. Leaving these gentlemen to 

 fight it out, I meanwhile subscribe myself. 



Neilgherry Hills, 30th July. One of Them. 



Another correspondent is rather harden Ceylon planters: — 

 SiE,— Your correspondent " M. P.," must pardon me 

 if I fail to see how he in any way explains the deterior- 

 ation in colour in the last few years. In the first place, 

 Oeylon men are and have been quite sufficiently plentiful 

 in Wynaad to have " proved experimentally " to us how 

 we should improve the colour, by such care as " M. P." 

 recommends. That their colour is no better than that of 

 other planters is proved by the fact that the coffee from 

 the whole district is much the same, aud the leading Oeylon 

 planter in this part is one of the most energetic enquirers 

 at association meetings into the cause of the bad colour 

 of Wynaad coffee. " M. P." has shown us what the Oeylon 

 planter tliiuks of himself and others. He must excuse 

 my saying we have generally found Oeylon planters a 

 failure here. They do not seem to be able to work with 

 Wynaad labour, and therefore, perhaps, we rarely see the 

 results we expect after so much lecturing. The crux which 

 "M. P." tails to explain, is why the same men on the 

 same estates, several of them superior Oeylon men, and 

 working far more carefully than they did six years ago, 

 cannot produce anything like the bean they did then at 

 a far lower cost. jVud why, may I ask, " M. P." was 

 Ceylon coffee such a wretchedly poor sample in London 

 during 1884, if curing has anything at all to do with it ? 

 There can be no doubt at all of the cause. The one great 

 change in our conditions in the last fifteen years has been 

 the advent of leaf disease. This did not tell much on the 

 samp'e for six or seven years, but now it has, ami more 

 especially on crop taken from trees grown from diseased 

 beans, or say, since 1873, by which time the disease was 

 fairly established and telling on the old trees. Young 

 coffee does not grow and cover the ground as it did fifteen 

 years ago, even though planted on similar soil alongside 

 magnificent old trees. It grows well till the first check 

 from crop or drought, and then loses every leaf with leaf 

 disease. It vigorous coffee on good laud, it will look 

 magnificent again in three months, but only to get another 

 shock next dry weather, and it is these drains on the 

 trees which ruin the sample. Now for a remedy. One 

 has been found in leaving the ghaut, and going inland to 

 bamboo land, where the sample always has been better 

 than on the average ghaut estates, but which formerly 

 was shunned on account of borer, drought killing the trees 

 after a few magnificent crops, and fever killing the planter. 

 Shade now saves the trees, and clearing has checked the 

 fever, but I doubt very much if shade gives the colour. 

 Climate, a dry, not forcing climate, gives the colour and 

 boldness; and shade is necessary for the coffee to last. 

 Mysore and Coorg are both too hot and dry for coffee 

 without shade, but it does not therefore follow that shade 

 and not climate is the cau.se. A second remedy is a 

 cattle manure with a little bone dust, a sure and certain 

 remedy mth or without shade, but as it costs at least 



