240 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [October i, 1885. 



and native by shadiug from a fierce sun. The 

 coffee below with its rcots kept cool and moist by 

 the shadow and the litter of the leaves. A rich 

 aromatic smell of the pungent fruit pervadirg the 

 •whole atmosphere. Birds lifting their sweet and varied 

 notes as they hunted the insects and obeyed the 

 behests of their Creator. Ah! biids, where ore the 

 feathered songsters on the dry blighted ridges where 

 once thejak flourished and bem fitted man, bird, 

 beast, and plant? Your sweet notes were wont to 

 waken the planter and fill the gladts with rich 

 music as the yellow rays of the sun spread themselves 

 over " the happy viilley." Your busy bills and 

 sharp eyes were in full operation and were better 

 pest searchers tbau little boys with the medicine 

 phials. Little boys know where it is still possible 

 to get a ripe jak fruit, and l.ttle boys' bellies get 

 tilled by otlier means than " helopeltis," therefore 

 little birds who dfpeiid on insects for their food 

 are the best. Prevention is better than cure. 

 Birds are better than bug-doctors or mould-doctors 

 or any other doctors. 



Why say more about Shade? I was glad to see 

 a very nice crop setting beautifully two days ago 

 and the young flushes seem to bo growing unblighted. 

 The majority of the men are putting in Rubber 

 because they are thoroughly scared by light, and 

 similarly to the wicked who *' love darkness 

 rather than light." Now rubber is a particularly 

 dense cover. It injures plants below it when it 

 begins to fruit. It .stands lopping as well as a 

 scho dboy enj ^ys hacking. You can hack it but it 

 fills up the gap — ai d so you must " keep on doing 

 it" and that costs momy. Try rows of it and you 

 find that the gain by lateral shade is equalized or 

 neutralized by the loss by vertical shade ; try clumps 

 of it with the same result. Then when jou find this 

 out cut it all down and " here ye are again," and 

 not quite in the same pilace. You remember the 

 parable of the man who had the devil taken out of 

 him and deliberately invited seven other devils, 

 ** and the last state fj that inan was worite than 

 the Jirsl." Thus with rubber. You will have lost 

 time, money, opp rtunity, and now you have your 

 land filled with tubi rous roots which are as inimical 

 to good husbandry as the celebrated " coia piUuo" 

 which is sufficiently known in Dumbara. 



The " Bois Immortelle" has its indigenous 

 sister in the jungles of Ceylon. The " Inga 

 Snman'' and the "' lunamadilla" are both indi- 

 genous as also the syoarnore (or true fig) tree. 

 The "charcoal" tree is a light cover and does 

 no harm and is also found m your jungles. I 

 need not enlarge on this, nor need I invite any- 

 one to Mysoie. At WaniapoUa as I ai'companied 

 the hospitable, travelled and deepthinkiug young 

 owner I could only say : " Surely this is not; Ceylon. 

 It is the land of Mysore." He m exact line 

 with R. B. T. is aimii g at a "West Indian" 

 property. The Dumbaia "lights" aimed at a 

 "Ceylon" property and they have got it with all 

 the concomitants. Kurunegala and Polgahawela 

 are said "lobe good for ti-a." That has rather a 

 dubious sound, at any rate as regards any other 

 product. 



I do not arree with the style of Clerihews. 

 In fact a "Fruit Drier" is moi'e in accordance 

 with my ideas, and these ideas I found to be iu 

 perfect consonance with the only man who ii.=es 

 one of those admirable machines. The Sirocco is 

 said to be a " crib" from ihe American inventon. 

 Nov in drying material the objtct is to have 

 moderate heat with thu moist draught sn as to 

 save fuel and remove steam. Oiei balance this 

 and you will find a waste of fu' 1 as compared 

 with the drying power of your heat. Having worked 



a Clerihew for three crops in drying cardamon $ 

 I am interested to see how they use them in 

 Ceylon. In Mysore a long room twelve feet wide 

 and fifty feet long with a reepered lluoriug is the 

 style of thing. At one end there is a battery 

 of a few and large pipes with a large furnace (in 

 Ceylon they have many and small pipes, with a 

 small furnace). This leads into the room and 

 pours in a hot blast. Now if you attempted 

 shelves you would end in rather a mess. But in 

 Mjsore we can get 160° at the fan end of the 

 room and keep that up. One man said he could 

 get up far above this. " How did the coolies 

 stand it ?" I asked. " Oh, I stayed myself two 

 hours." I then asked where the thermometer was, 

 and I saw where he was. But Dumbara men say 

 heat must be very gradual and moderate, as the 

 colour which has been acquired by fermentation, 

 is all driven out of the cacao. At WorriapoUa 

 I was told the West Iniliau plan — and Cjuick 

 sudden heat was there advocated. Dumbara men 

 then point triumphantly to the market, and 

 " prood " men are they. The market is really the 

 test. To continue the desciiption of a Clerihew, 

 I must first state that they are used by only one 

 man in India and he it is who maintained the 

 monopoly of the cardamom market m the world 

 for years. Messrs. Walker & Co. of Ceylon (the 

 planters' right hand) sent a man to put up Cleri- 

 hews on this cardamom place many years ago, 

 and they have been worked there on a very 

 simple jjlan ever since. I l.ave described the 

 size of room and style of pipes and fuinace. The 

 fruit is laid on soft cloth through which the air 

 is easily sucked and care is taken that it be very 

 thinly spread out. The soft cloth is spread on 

 the floor and on one permanent plutform and the 

 double fan at the end creates a strong draught. 

 This is the simple "Clerihew." Ceylon men fill 

 up their room with shelves. So thiit their theory 

 of gradual moderate heat is very difficult to carry 

 out, anrl is attempted by a crude aud clumsy 

 arrangement of moving the trays al out. The risk 

 of fire must be very great. Then they have 

 wooden ceilings. I should say that that must be 

 dangerous. We founil in India that fireproof ceil- 

 ings made of lath and plaster were much to be 

 preferred. Before that was adopted serious loss 

 by fire was the result. You can't improve on the 

 sweet simplicity of Clerihew. I saw two Black- 

 man's Air Propellers. It's a fancy article, and, 

 on account of its requiring less power to drive 

 it, is a gain iu a district where firewood or water 

 is a difficulty. It cuts the wind out, wheieas the 

 fan knocks it out. To use trajs properly each 

 layer ought to be in a separate division with com- 

 munications with the hot flue and the fan. When 

 the air rushes in at the orifice it goes bang into 

 the near and central shoves and dries them, 

 moistening itself and neglecting the side-shelves. 

 To put this riglit they put coolies on to exchange 

 the hot fiuit for the cool fruit and so on, as I 

 said before crudely and clumsily. The weak point 

 lies in the self-sati^fiedness in results. There is 

 always room for improvement aud this very thing 

 baa caused Ceylon as compared to the plauting 

 districts of India to be as America is to Great 

 Britain. I know that the cacao which fetched 

 the highest prices was dried in very fierce heat 

 on Ihe floor on the primitive Clerihew system. 

 Increase your air-exhausting power .nnd your fur- 

 naces aud you will have a drying machine that 

 beats any newfangled notions. If you wish shelves, 

 have them isolated along the whole length so 

 that a current of hot dry air will pass over ojj, 

 surface aud remove the moisture in steam. A\\ 



