30 



flowering buds develop, and thus, if not taken in time, will cause the flower 

 spurs to die out and spoil the next year's crop. Thrips is an insect pest that 

 develops among the foliage, and then attacks the pods, causing them to abort 

 and wither, so that half the pods will have no seeds. The rats sometimes do 

 a great deal of damage to the cocoa by gnawing holes in the pods to get at 

 the seeds ; and several of the woodpeckers have learnt how to drill holes into 

 the pods and extract the seeds. 



The trees are planted from 12 to 18 feet apart, and should be grown under 

 shade for the first five years at least. At ten years old they can shade them- 

 selves, but among the planters there is a great amount of controversy and 

 argument as to whether these trees should be grown in shade or in the open. 

 They bear flowers, which spring directly from the trunk or main branches, 

 when eighteen months old ; there are always an immense number of pods that 

 never reach maturity, as nature throws off the superfluous ones. The pods, 

 when full grown, are cut off and the beans shelled, fermented in a vat, then 

 taken out and spread on a drying-roof ; from this they are taken and placed 

 in a cylindrical drum or roaster through which hot air is forced, and thus dried, 

 they are ready for market. All the plantation negroes are paid by piece-work, 

 and the average wages are about Is. 6d. per day. The cocoa crop of the 

 West Indies in 1905-6 was valued at 1,500,000. It is the sole crop of 

 Granada, in Trinadad ; it is worth more than double the output of sugar, and 

 is grown in St. Lucia, Dominica, and St. Vincent. The average yield in 

 Granada is 4 bags of 196 Ib. per acre, or equal to 784 Ib. per acre. In 1906-7 

 the quantity of cocoa exported from Jamaica was 50,057 cwt., valued at 

 190,216. At Worthy Park there is a considerable acreage under sugar- 

 cane, some of which is crushed for sugar, though all the profits come from the 

 distillation of rum. Mr. Cdlder crushes about 500 tons of sugar every 

 season. 



From E wart on I went down to Spanish Town by train, and then took a 

 coach to the Hartlands Fruit Company Estate. Here the manager, Mr. 

 Wigens, has 190 acres of citrus trees, grape fruit, mandarins, and oranges. 

 Among the latter are Washington Navels, though they consider the Bahia 

 Navel is a sweeter fruit. The King orange is a very coarse, rough-skinned 

 fruit, like a small rounded mandarin, and though an orange it tastes like a, 

 mandarin, and is said to have been introduced from Florida. The grape 

 fruit pays best of all his crops, and he is now shipping a good number to the 

 London markets. This country is very flat, heavy land, and was originally 

 planted with bananas, but the soil did not suit them. The trees appear to 

 be planted rather low in the ground and suffer a good deal from collar rot, 

 which not only attacks the base of the stem but also often high up on the 

 side of the trunk. This they treat with tar and fish oil, or Jay's Fluid, after 

 cutting off the diseased bark. 



There was no red scale, but Aspidiotus cilri and Aspidiotus fid were 

 common on the trees and fruit. Melanose disfigured a great deal of the f ruit,. 

 but was not looked upon as a pest, for the English buyers do not take any 

 )t;ce of !-, as long as the fruit is well grown. Last year Jamaica exported 

 32,00 ) packages (Florida cases) of grape fruit worth 6s. a package and 

 55,000 oranges, worth about 2s. 6d. per hundred. 



From Hartlands I went on to Montego Bay on the north end of the island, 

 and another port where bananas and other fruit are sent on to America. 

 Stopping on the road at Mandeville, I saw quantities of the large scarlet loose- 

 skinned mandarin that is peculiar to that district, and is known as the, 

 .Mandeville mandarin. 



