vi Coco-nuts The Consols of the East 



At the same time no one can deny that the 

 very care taken by Messrs. Hamel Smith and 

 Pape to place the utilization of by-products of 

 a coco-nut planting industry in a prominent 

 light, so as to attract the desirable class of 

 capitalist, has incited the more or. less undesir- 

 able class of company promoter to seize the 

 opportunity to make use of the book to exploit 

 the public for their own ends and to quote only 

 those portions which fit in with their tale to 

 draw money from the pockets of the ignorant 

 and careless investor, without including other 

 facts that did not suit their purpose. 



For instance, whilst all the prospectuses and 

 other notices issued openly or as "private and 

 confidential " prominently displayed the first 

 sentence of my " Foreword " to the first 

 edition (see p. xi), which runs as follows : " I 

 know of no field of tropical agriculture that 

 is so promising at the present moment as coco- 

 nut planting, and I do not think in the whole 

 world there is a promise of so lucrative an 

 investment of time and money as in this 

 industry," I noticed that not one included 

 my expression of opinion that " the amount 

 of capital required to become the possessor 

 of a rich coco-nut plantation is not excessive, 

 and should not exceed 10 to 12 per acre, 

 including every expense except the planter's 

 own labour and interest on capital." Grave 

 exception has been taken to this estimate by 

 those who have not read the Foreword care- 



