'6iS 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [March i, 1886. 



new, costly and practically complete), we have the 

 well-roacled and drained estate of 549 acres (in an 

 almost perfect climate) with cultivation approx- 

 imately as follows : — 



Coffee and cinchona . . . . 200 acres 



Tea esclusively . . . . . . 220 ,, 



Tea and coffee . . . . . . .50 



Grass .. .. .. .. 4 ,, 



Shelter trees 15 ,, 



Total cultivated 479 acres 

 Reserve forest 70 ,, 



Total extent, 649 acres 

 Calculating buildings, machinery and land, the 

 present value of the property ie about ecjual to 

 the balance of expenditure, with added value accru- 

 n g every day, as tea is extended and comes into 

 bearing. In converting coffee into tea estates, of 

 course the cost of clearing is very much lower 

 than if forest had to be dealt with, and in the 

 case of comparatively young estates at high alt- 

 itudes, the soil has received all the benelits of 

 tillage without being to any appreciable extent 

 exhausted by the crops previously borne. In answer 

 to the objection, so frequently made by strangers 

 to the country, that the soil must be rapidly 

 washed away from steep hillsides in Ceylon, 

 because they are not terraced, after the fashion 

 of Java and some parts of India ; it may be 

 stated that our Ceylon soils and subsoils con- 

 tain a much larger proportion of clay than those 

 of .lava and India and that while such soil 

 is eminently suitable for tea, it is so tenacious 

 that terracing can be dispensed with in favour of 

 a good system of surface drains, such as prevails 

 here, in addition to roads and paths of good gradi- 

 ents, which largely help the drainage. 



NOTICES OP THE''rHOTOC.RAPHS. 

 FOKEST BEING FeLLED BY SINHALESE. — lu this 



Operation, the first in "opening" an estate, the 

 natives of Ceylon excel. Cutting the trees half 

 through from the base of a hill up the more or less 

 steep incline, they ultimately take advantage of a 

 specially large monarch of the forest wliich they 

 cut right through, so that in its fall it produces 

 an impetus before which all below goes down with 

 a loud crash. This operation is generally performed 

 so as to be completed in November, in order that 

 the forest may be ready for " a good burn " in 

 February and for holing and planting in April- 

 August. Besides felling, burning and " clearing up" 

 forest, the Sinhalese will engaged in contracts for 

 the carpenter and mason work of estate buildings, 

 but it was rarely they could, (until tlie recent period 

 of depression from the large failure of the coffee 

 enterprise, when their poverty more than their will 

 consented), be induced to take part in ordinary estate 

 work ; especially in association with their old 

 enemies the Tamils of Southern India, whose necess- 

 ities and desire to improve their condition have led 

 them to migi-ate to Ceylon in very large numbers 

 during the past forty-five years of the planting 

 enterprise. 



Tea, Coffee and Cinchona Nursebies. — These, our 

 second set of nurseries (the first having been formed 

 at the southern end of the estate in 1871), were 

 opened in nr> sheltered valley behind the assistant's 

 bungalow, tlie first oonsigimieut of hybrid tea seed 

 from the Assam Company being received and sown 

 here in December 1874. The reticulated objects in the 

 foreground are branches of trees pUiced on plat- 

 forms for purposes of shade, and from which all 

 the leaves have disappeared. It was soon discovered 

 in Ceylon, that, wliile shade is useful for coffee 

 seedlings and iudispcusable for ciucboua beds, it is, 



at high elevations at least, supei-fluous in the case 

 of the hardy and cosmopolitan tea plant, which 

 grows well in regions where snow falls, 40° or 

 further from the equator in China, while it flourishes 

 with luxuriance in proportion to the heat and 

 moisture of the climate, at 7° north in Ceylon. A 

 waterfall, of which merely a glimpse can be obtained 

 amidst the felled forest, tumbles down the steep 

 hill behind, which is planted up to the limits of 

 the forest belt with oofi'ee, cinchona and tea. 



General View of the Estate, Looking Socth- 

 w.UiDS. — The view was taken from the rear of the 

 assistant superintendent's bungalow, which lies in 

 a sheltered valley, 4,900 feet above sea-level, and 

 which was specially devoted to coffee, tea and 

 cinchona nurseries. The effect of the felled and 

 partially burnt forest in the foreground is, of course, 

 enormously exaggerated by proximity to the camera, 

 but the scene gives a vivid idea of the beginnings 

 of hill forest cultivation in the tropics, and shews 

 how utterly absent the conditions are which would 

 afford scope for the . plough and the harrow. 

 The implements used instead are, a hce called 

 " manvetti " (earth-cutter), an "alavanga" or 

 crowbar, and three-pronged forks. In the more 

 advanced cultivation in the background are seen 

 the bungalow to the left, and the school-house and 

 cooly-lines to the right, while behind the belt of 

 forest separating the estate from " Cymru," lie 

 the bold-featured " Railway Gorge " and the ex- 

 quisitely beautiful Agra patanas, on which, and on 

 the neighbouring Bopatalawa patanas, the Duke 

 of Edinburgh hunted Ceylon elk (sambhur deer) 

 n 1870. 



General View of the Estate, Lookinci North- 

 wards. — In the near foreground are tea and cinchona 

 nurseries with the original two sets of cooly lines, 

 the school-house and bungalow with a glimpse 

 of the cofl'ee store, two more sets of cooly hues 

 and the assistant's bungalow. The view is interest- 

 ing as showing a plantation in varied stages of its 

 early formation. Beyond the nurseries, opened in 

 November 1871, are rows of cott'ee bushes, three 

 and a quarter years old, extending to the right of 

 the cooly lines in the foreground. These shade 

 away to one and three quarter years old coffee 

 above the assistant's bungalow, and end in altern- 

 ations of felled and standing forest running up the 

 sides of the range, which the Nanuoya (rising on 

 Pidurutalagala, the highest mountain in Ceylon, 

 altitude 8,29-5 feet, — and running into Dimbula) 

 separates from the Nuwara Eliya mountains. All 

 of the forest represented in the view, except reserve 

 belts of about 70 acres out of 549, has since dis- 

 appeared in favour of coffee, cinchona, tea and 

 ornamental and useful trees, tlie latter chiefly 

 natives of Australia and the Himalayas. To show how 

 home names are reproduced in the case of Ceylon 

 l)lantations, it may be mentioned that amongst 

 estates immediately adjoining are : Abbotstord, 

 Edinburgh, Inverness, Lome, Glashaugh, Aadneven ; 

 Cymru ; Avoca ; Carlabeck and Langdale. 



View from " Knock Ferkoi.," 5,200 feet above 

 Sea-level, I. — Cinchona plants and stumps of felled 

 forest occupy the near foreground, then rows of 

 coffee not sufficiently grown (only about .SJ years 

 old) to liide the stumps and trunks of trees wliich 

 escaped the fire and which are left on the ground 

 to gradually decay, so fertilizing the soil. Coffee 

 in its fifth or sixth year thoroughly conceals the 

 charred and skeleton-like trees, so prominent on 

 young estates. On old estates, where the fallen 

 timber has been used up or has decayed, the 

 absence of firewood for the coolies and now for the 

 tea furnaces is a serious want, and the time seems 

 imminont when a considerable quantity of coal, 



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