June i, 1886.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



S69 



country, coffee planters all grow it, but this is to 

 inftlcc them indeixiulent in tlicir rood supply from 

 any other source than their own farm. They, the 

 planters, use it in the far interior to feed pigs, 

 and to be food for their cattle and nniles in crop 

 time ; and in the districts where the 15ra/.ilian coffee 

 crops MOW come from, it would pay as a '••pro- 

 duct " to take the place of coffee. 



Before I conclude this on Indian corn, I would 

 suggest that it may be tried on some of your 

 estates to supply local consumption. It could, I 

 think, be grown all over Ceylon, as it is all over 

 Brazil. Different districts would require .liflVrcnt 

 times to plant it. The month of April would suit 

 the most of your districts as a planting season. 

 During the S.W.. monsoon in .lune or .luly it wqvild 

 be in nice time to come into full flower : " after 

 the blossom is icell set," all is, secure. 



I was to have touched on mandioea and beans 

 the other two .siffc-.sK(<stitutes for coffee in our ex- 

 hausted districts, but these must be left for an- 

 other occasion. A. SCOTT-BLACKLAW. 



P.S. — CoffiW — Yqu are in the habit of receiving 

 the regular price-currents and must be as well in- 

 formed as I am about our exports : from Rio was 

 shipped to 31st December 1^85, 4,20fi,011 sacks of 

 60 kilos, against :-i,8',t7,113 in 1884. Santos, I am 

 not so much connected with as formerly, so have 

 not the figures. 



The SeuKon has been a dry one and complaints 

 are made in the newspapers of the young berries 

 falling off the trees in many parts. It is tlie crop 

 season nftcr a di7 year, in which the coffee crop 

 suffers diminution. 



T.iilionr Snpphj keeps ap : slaves are not diminish- 

 ing much, but at same time, owing to recent legis- 

 lation, slavery is said to have its limit fixed to IH years. 



KiinijH'dii Colonistn are helping the labour supply 

 in Sao Faulo very much. On the whole, I see 

 nothing to f^top fiirtJicr extomon of coffee planting, 

 but a stoppage in railway making. Government is 

 assisting this latter consummation by giving out no 

 more guarantees, and seeking every excuse for the 

 evasion of stipulated conditions in the contract on 

 the part of Railway Companies to withhold the 

 guarantee and rescind or cancel the concession. 

 This course is necessitated by the state of (iovern- 

 ment funds which are not over-plentiful, and owing 

 to the recklessness of former Governments in the 

 giving of guarantees. Some of the railways already 

 opened within the last two years guaranteed by Gov- 

 ernment in virtue of a law empowering it to make 

 contracts with concessionaries for railways, provided 

 three per ce nt of profit could be shown as a 

 mininmm, the Government at most losing the 

 difference between this and the six per cent guar- 

 anteed on a stipulated sum approved by Govern- 

 ment as capital of the Company, have been worked 

 at an enormous loss, and others not yet opened 

 are expected to be no better. Conselheiro Antonio 

 Prado, the present Minister* ha? his work before 

 him. It is lucky that Brazil has such an able 

 Btatesman as its Minister of Agriculture and Public 

 Works. The son of a wealthy coffee merchant of 

 Santos (now retired) and himself a most successful' 

 toffee planter and introducer of Colonial labourers 

 on his own account from Europe, he brings the 

 practical to bear on the somewhat conventional 

 usages of a department which at the present time 

 has to give new lite to this expansible country. 

 Bouie of his late acts in withdrawing guarantees 

 have the appearance of rashness and entire want 

 of sympathy with a speculating public— A. S. B^ 



* He used to be a reader of the Cii/hii <>h> ■,:;■,■ wlien 

 I knew liiin a few years ago, criticized my writing 

 severely, but wc remained good friends. I scarcely 

 tbiuli U"(j ba» forgottou my letters ou Slavery in l'j»2, 



DUTIES ON TEA AND CONSUMPTION. 

 (From the J'/W«cr Marlcii JUfkiv, Ainil 17th.) 

 The followiug Bnti'^li Colonies and Possessions im- 

 pose no duty ou tea; India, Strails Sottleincnts, 

 IiHbuan, Ilong Kong, F;ilkUn I Islands, .St. Helena, 

 Sierri TjC'nie, (i.imbia, Gibraltar, and Jlalta. Tlie 

 duty in Mauritius is id per U). In Newfouiulland it 

 is '-'id per lb., and 1.) psr cent. The following colonies 

 chartte ;id per lb. : New South AVales, Victoria, South 

 Australia iGl in the northern tt^rritory), Tasinaiiia, 

 Fiji, and Ba-.-bailns. 'I^he following chilrge -Id per 11». r 

 AVestern Australia. New Zealand, Antigua, and Mont- 

 serrat. Oeylon charges 5^d. The colonies that charge 

 6d. per lb. are CJueensland. Turk's Island, St. Lucia. 

 St. Vincent, Uieiuula, Tobago, Dominica, Trinidad, 

 and British Gnivna. Natal charges 7d ami the Oape 

 of Good Hope 8cl per lb. The following charge Is 

 per lb. : Honduras, Bahamas, and; 'Jamaica. Canada 

 charges 10 per cent ad I'aloiriii ou imports from the 

 United States ; otlii-r teas arc duty-free Lagos and 

 the Gold Coast charge 1 per cent nd vulm-ew. Ber- 

 muda charges .5 per cent, ad I'tdumn. The Virgin 

 Islands charge 7.v per c^ut- and St. Christopher and 

 Nevis S per cent, ad I'lilorviii. The remarkable dis- 

 crepancli^s between iieighboviring colonies cannot be 

 helped when seif-governineut l.as been granted to them, 

 but our Colonial Olhco is surely to blame in allowing 

 such a confu.sed system to prevail in colonial groups 

 under its own control. For instance there are no 

 less than si.v v.irieties of tea duties in the West 

 Indies. Oeylon is nllowt-d to l(;vy a duty of 5^d., 

 which can serve no purpose, now that so much tea 

 is grown there, unless it be a protective one. The 

 other Grown ( olonies levy tea duties on no percept- 

 ible vrinciple. The above figures are taken from the 

 Coloil'ufI }<(iitistuat Ahstraci. 



The following from the Sliilint gives the general 

 consumption of tea iu round figures : — 



Ad. con- An av. '-oii- 



ainnption sump, per 



Jieud of pop. 



in English in liluglisli 



pounds, pouiida. 



Australian Colouios 18,018,000 7'l)ti 



New Zealand :j,!W>a.00O TZt 



Great Britain, LSSti ir.S,(i.V>,onO 4'1I0 



New toundland... 821.000 1-38 



Oanada I'i.tiOO.Oiio .'i'tiU 



Tusaiania 3811,:.'30 :yiH 



Various Britisli possessions, 18S1, about - 3,9;<o,oon riiii 



United Stutos, about .' 11.1,000,000 1'30 



Holland 4,:Sm:;..1oo fO.'i 



Cape Colony I,lL'S.i',Oo 0*90 



Nalal :! 7,:to(i 71) 



Ku.^sia H-MO.S..nOO O'tjl 



Denmark 710,000... O'.'t? 



Ar^culinc Repnbllu, 1883-84 000,000 U'.SO 



Persia, IHSi, about 1.ot;',woo 0"l;t 



PortU'-al .31, 1, Olio o-l:.' 



Switzerland, 18S0-82 l",c',(Hiii o-lO 



Norway ." 170, -100 (fO'J 



Germany 3,n:<,500 07 



Morocoo, about 3.^4,000 0'Olj 



Uelgium, 188:1 203.000 0*03 



Sweilen, lssO-83 l.'Kl,2oO O'O.^ 



Austria Hungary, 1883-84 731i,.'i00 ovj 



Spain, 1884 - 13U.0O0 Ool 



TEA IN CHINA, 



Sir Robert Hart has done Chinese tea growers 

 a kindness, in urging their Government to im- 

 press upon them the danger they run in the 

 near future from foreign competition. The tea 

 exported to foreign countries has, he declares, 

 been steadily deteriorating of late ; and Chinese 

 merchants, seeing that notwithstanding its inferior- 

 ity it is taken a the same, have been encouraged 

 in their careless manufacture, " forgetting thai, 

 by this manner of making profit, they are running 

 to certain ruin." Chinese dealers ma\' be supposed 

 to know something about the increasing produc- 

 tion of Indian and other teas, but the grower is 

 prohaby ijiiite ignorant of the danger. Sir Robert 

 llart woud have it impressed upon him that, besides 

 Japaiicbc tea which is being exported everywhere, 



