Cocott'Nut Oil Manufacture. 39 j 



visited one of the largest industrial enterprises in Ceylon, 

 known as Hnltsdorf Mill, a cocoa-nut-oil factory, the pro- 

 prietorship consisting in shares, of which the largest holder 

 is David Wilson, Esq., the Austrian Consular Agent. Here 

 are carried on all the various processes connected with the 

 manufacture, the preparation of the oil-cake from the cocoa- 

 nut, the expressure of the oil, &c., which are carried on by 

 apparatus, partly sent out from England, partly put up in 

 this country, all set in motion by steam-engines. The task 

 assigned in these factories to the natives, of whom above a 

 thousand are employed in the various departments, is, never- 

 theless, not the less important and significant, that, while 

 machinery is used in those processes where it is necessary to 

 use an agency far transcending the powers of mere human 

 labour, all collateral products, such as soap, candles, per- 

 fumery, as also the implements and tools required for the 

 works, and even the barrels and chests required for the 

 transport of the manufactures, are prepared and used by 

 handicraft labour. 



To the thoughtful visitor it is a scene of no ordinary 

 interest to behold several hundreds of Cingalese, Hindoos, and 

 Mozambique negroes, all thoroughly conversant with the 

 management of the most magnificent invention of the nine- 

 teenth century. Here are a number of artisans employed at the 

 hydraulic presses and iron turning-lathes ; in another apart- 

 ment the various parts of the different machines are being 

 constructed or put together, which regulate the pressure of 



