IV 



CLOVES 185 



crepancy may be accounted for by the alteration in the rating, 

 which was at first per 300 pishi. I wanted the headmen, etc. 

 to receive a fair, but not an excessive wage ; as the season 

 advanced I found that I had under-estimated the daily pick, 

 which was about 400 instead of 300 pishi, so I altered the 

 rating accordingly. The spreaders were allowed 3 pice each 

 per day, but at Kitumba, where the quantity of cloves to handle 

 was proportionally much less, the spreaders were paid at a higher 

 rate. This would introduce another slight error into the first 

 calculation. The whole of the Kitumba staff of headmen, etc. 

 should in reality have been rated differently, but this would 

 have led to confusion in the accounts, which were kept by an 

 Arab who, admirably as he did his work, was not familiar with 

 European methods of book-keeping. For the same reason I 

 abandoned at Machui the idea of paying the pickers at the rate 

 of 4 pice for every pishi picked after the first 6. Where super- 

 vision is difficult, as it is in clove picking, this system would 

 most certainly have led to imposture by the people. It would, 

 for instance, have been easy for two or three to have united their 

 day's gatherings in order to make up the required quantity for 

 the extra pice. At Dunga, which was, I believe, the only place 

 where the system was adopted, we had got a sufficient amount 

 of cloves to judge of its efficacy. 



The net returns to December 31 are then shown to be 

 E.6,142. Allowing now for the estimated 300 fraslas still to 

 pick, and valuing them at 5 rupees a frasla, the price to which 

 cloves subsequently dropped, the total net returns are increased 

 to R. 7,245. 



Account Statement for the Season (Approx.) 



Net returns to December 31 .... K.6,142 

 300 fraslas at K.5 1,500 



Total . . R.7,642 



Cost 'of gathering 300 fraslas .... 397 



Balance profit ....... 7,245 



Total . . R.7,642 

 Balance profit . . R.7,245 



Rupees 7,245 from 8,500 trees is equal to an income of 13J 

 annas per tree. 



The waste upon the trees, which I have estimated at J of 

 the crop, would, if collected, have sufficed to pay for the entire 

 expenditure. My object here, however, is to compare our 

 actual expenditure and receipts, and to arrive at a fair estimate 



