24 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 



The Coffee plant was introduced from Java into the 

 island of Ceylon by the Dutch in 1720, where they 

 began to cultivate it without any successful results, their 

 efforts being confined to the lowlands in the districts of 

 Galle and Negonogo, the location proving unfavorable 

 in soil and temperature, the natives being also opposed 

 to the innovation. But although some coffee of excel- 

 lent quality was produced, notwithstanding these ob- 

 stacles, it was found that it could not be cultivated there 

 to advantage, when compared with the Java product. 

 Yet though suspended for a time by the Dutch, it was 

 not entirely abandoned by the native Cingalhese, who 

 having, in the meantime, learned the commercial value 

 of the article, continued to grow it in small quantities, so 

 that after the British obtained possession of the island 

 the Moors, who collected it in the villages, brought the 

 hulled beans to Galle and Colombo, to barter them for 

 cutlery, cotton and trinkets. It is claimed, on the other 

 hand, to have been grown in Ceylon long before the 

 arrival of the Dutch, and even the Portuguese, but that the 

 preparatiofl of a beverage from its fruit was unheard of 

 by the natives, who only employed its tender leaves for 

 their curries, and its delicate, jassamine-like flowers for 

 ornamenting their shrines and temples. On the occupa- 

 tion of Ceylon, after its concession to the British in 

 1825, however, the English troops found the coffee tree 

 growning in profusion in the vicinity of the temples in 

 Kandy, and also large coffee gardens, highly cultivated, 

 were found on the banks of the river Mahawelli and 

 close to the palace of Hangaurau. 



The coffee plant was introduced into the Phillipine 

 Islands by Spanish missionaries from Java about 1740, 

 but a species of wild coffee trees have been found on the 

 island of Luzon, the berries being left ungathered, the 



