34 ' Coffee Planting. 



annual tax of 2 rupees per acre, which can only be 

 compounded for by payment of 25 years' tax (50 

 rupees per acre), besides the cost of survey and any 

 additional sum to which the bidding may have been 

 run up by competition. 



In view of these terms, the demand for Govern- 

 ment land in the Wynaad has been less than for 

 that owned by private holders. Many of the 

 more important temples were originally largely 

 endowed with lands, and as these have hitherto 

 remained uncultivated and useless, the trustees of 

 these endowments, as well as other native pro- 

 prietors, have usually been found willing to dispose 

 of suitable tracts of forest to intending planters at 

 about 10 rupees per acre. The titles thus acquired 

 have in general been found good, and land thus 

 obtained is free of tax until under cultivation, when 

 an assessment of 2 rupees per acre begins to be 

 levied. as on land bought from Government. 



This annual tax, of 2 rupees per acre on all coffee 

 land in full bearing, is somewhat unfair in its in- 

 cidence, no consideration being given to the amount 

 of crop yielded ; it might, with advantage, be 

 replaced by one more on the principle of the export 

 duty levied in Ceylon of 8 annas per cwt. at the 

 port of shipment. 



In Coorg, the rules for the sale of waste lands 

 are very favourable to the man of small means. If 



