May I, 1886.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



7S9 



ligures are : — 



United KingJom . . . . 150,251,000 lb. 



United States .. .. (il,552,000 „ 



Australia and New Zealand 21,7liit,000 „ 



Continent of Europe .. H,r.(il,000 ., 



Total . . 215,233.000 lb. 

 It will be seen that more than 3-5ths 

 of the whole went direct to Britain, while Britain's 

 Australian colonists took a ijuantity, which madeovei;, 

 172 millions lb. for the British race, exclusive of 

 Canada which is lumped up with the United States 

 In our '■ Handbook and Directory " we liud our 

 calculation for the maximum export from China 

 and Japan is 275,000,000 lb. 



I'LANTIXG IN NETHEKLANDS INDIA. 



(Tmiislatcd for the Straits Times.) 

 In Cotie on the East Coast of Borneo, a Dutch- 

 owned tobacco estate, the first one ever started 

 there, has been opened. Simultaneously another 

 plantation of the same kind has been established 

 by a Netherlander within British territory in North 

 Borneo. In that land of promise a German to- 

 bacco estate which has just entered its second year, 

 on an island, is still the only outcome of planting 

 enterprize. 



A company with capital amounting to2,100,000 

 guilders has just been started at Amsterdam under 

 the style of "the Palembang, Company." A Pam- 

 phlet has been circulated among persons interested 

 in the scheme giving particulars about Palembang, 

 which is described as being an extensive Proviuco 

 of the size of Java and Madura, but peopled only 

 by ti00,000 inhabitants found mainly on the high 

 tablelands, and on the rivers flowing there- 

 fram. The country abounds with wide- 

 spread forests, on land never yet brought under cultiv- 

 ation and full of the varied produce usually met 

 with iu the Sumatra woods such as rattans, rubber, 

 (luttii siilin, dammar, gum benjamin itc, besides an 

 abundance of splendid timber. The land along the 

 rivers is covered with a thick layer of humus and 

 is highly fertile. A concession has been secured from 

 Government which comprises the leasing to the 

 company of a portion of this land, to miles long 

 by 4 broad which will be turned to account partly for 

 growing gutta and tobacco, and partly for collecting 

 jungle produce. Broad, deep, and gently flow- 

 ing rivers in the neighbourhood ensure effective 

 means of communication both inland and with 

 the seaboard, close at hand. The climate is 

 as healthy as in Deli and is said to be very 

 suitable for tobacco growing. Coolies are procurable 

 from the chief town and Java. That tobacco of 

 good qiiality can be raised there is proved by 

 the fact that the native grown article, known by 

 the name of Bano tobacco, bears a high reputation 

 for atoma throughout Netherlands India. Experience 

 only will show whether it will be equal to Deli 

 tobacco. Easy and cheap communication by water 

 naturally will prove highly advantageous to the 

 enterprise. Indiarubber and gutta percha both 

 of which it is intended to grow are articles get- 

 ting more and more into demand for industrial 

 purposes. These gums are now mostly obtained 

 from gigantic trees the collection being carried 

 on by natives in a very reckle .s and rough fashion. 

 By their thoughtlessly cutting down the trees 

 before gatliering the product, the latter begins 

 to get scarcer. There i.i even danger of sup- 

 plies failing, the only means of prevention 

 being cultivation and jiulicious collection. Be- 

 sides these trees, where cultivation is at- 

 tended by diHiculties, there are in the P»lembaug 



forests, others from which by tapping, gums can 

 be obtained which, when purilied, eijual in quality 

 the best kinds know-n. These gums by means of 

 approved and inexpensive appliances can be brought 

 to market in thoroughly transparent condition. 

 These gum-yielding trees grow very abundantly in 

 the forests of Palembang, the article boing known 

 generally by the name of ifetiiJisnlitt. Plantations of 

 these trees may be expected to bear within seven 

 years with every prospect of handsome returns 

 regularly afterwards. The starting of the Company 

 is a good sign showing, as it does, that people 

 in Holland arc beginning to take an interest in 

 hitherto neglected colonial possessions. 



Another coffee estate in Mid Java, so says the 

 Sourabaya Caiiraiit, assessed at a i|uarter of a 

 million of guilders has been sold for a few thousands 

 only. Within the last few weeks several estates 

 have gone the same way, one of them bringing 

 only 8,000 guilders. Such cases bid fair to be on 

 the increase with the unavoidable result that the 

 mountain districts will for the most part relapse 

 into jungle. In .Surukarta, two coffee estates formerly 

 yielding thousands of piculs have reverted to (lov- 

 ernment from their having become utterly worth- 

 less and unsaleable owing to disease and low 

 quotations. — Batariu Dayhlail. 



CiNCHON.v Analysis and Value : tuk Difiek- 

 ENCE. — A planter has shown us correspondence 

 referring to a batch of over 1,000 lb. of cinchona 

 bark. The local analysis gave -52 per cent quinine, 

 and the local valuation was 11 to 13 cents per 

 lb. The bark on being sent to London was an- 

 alyzed 1'33 and sold at (i.^d per lb., or say three 

 times 11 cents ! 



Ceylon Tea. — The Colonics and India for this week 

 has_ the following paragraph relating to Ceylon tea. 

 While agreeing in the main with what is therein 

 stated, we cannot but observe that a great mistake 

 has been made in the assumption that " the first 

 samples made such a favourable impression on the 

 consumers here, that the market was, so to speak, 

 taken by storm." Quite the reverse, it is well- 

 known, was the case. Some years elapsed before 

 the brokers would look at the "black and nasty 

 stuff" which was sent home, although, as was re- 

 cently pointed out iu these letters, there was one 

 man, Mr. Boberts, who saw in it great possibilities 

 in the future. It is as well to bear this in mind 

 in order that no relapse may ever be ijermittcd : — 



A\'e have frequently drawn attentiou to the rapiil 

 gro.vth of tea cultivation in Ceylon aud to the high 

 place which the produce of the island has taken iu the 

 Euglish market. When we look back but a few years, 

 to tiud the whole of Ceylon practically one immense 

 coffee plautatiou, the quantity of tea which it uow ex- 

 ports is ni;irvellous. The principal cause of this rapid 

 growth of a new industry is to be fouiui in the uni- 

 formly high ijualily which Ceylon teas have maintained. 

 The fir.it .samples made such a favourable impression on 

 the consumer here that the market wa-*, ^o to speak, 

 taken by st-urm. Having achieved .•^o much, it is to be 

 hoped that the Ceylon planters will not sacrifice the 

 quality of their produce for the sake of quantity, as 

 has been done in China, for if they do tlicy will in- 

 evitably lose the mark»'t they have so firmly established. 

 It is a wcil-knowu fact that each year shows a greater 

 falling off in tlic qualtity of China teas, and to this fact 

 i.s to be attributed a large share of thn increase in the 

 consumption of IiHlia,u and Ceylon growths. Ceylon 

 teas (Mjmbine the l>est qualities of both Chinese and 

 Indian varieties, posse-ssiog both the delicacy of flavour 

 of the former and the strength of the latter, without the. 

 astriiigency which sometimes prevails to so unpleasant a 

 dcKri;!'. f.ct Indian and Ceylon plaulers all make 

 '•Quality" their watchword, aud they need not fe»r 

 competition elsewhere. 



