Ixiv. Timehri. 



power would have produced 370,000 plants which would have sufficed 

 for 4,000 acres. This shipment was made at the inception of Sir 

 Frederic Hodgson and its failure was a very keen disappointment to him. 



Fruit. 



On several occasions during 1897 the attention of the Society 

 or of its Committees was directed towards the possibility of the 

 establishment of an export trade with fruits of various types. 

 The then Government Botanist, the late G. S. Jenman, was an 

 enthusiastic advocate of the establishment of such an indus- 

 try. He was not a believer in the policy of endeavouring to make 

 a living by taking in one another's washing or by the mutual 

 interchange of swine, even if these were carried out on the soundest co- 

 operative basis. He held that no real advance could be made in the 

 colony either in the cacao, the coffee or other arboricultural industry 

 until it became feasible to export the transient products raised in fields 

 planted with such permanent crops and to sell them at remunerative 

 rates. He held that banana-growing was the special fruit-industry which 

 deserved encouragement ; he advocated planting here the Chinese, Caven- 

 dish or Dwarf banana and not the Jamaica kind as he had satisfied him- 

 self that under local conditions the Jamaica kind was very subject to 

 disease, whilst the plant grows so high and with an insufficiently robust 

 stem to bear the weight of the fruits without the bunches being sup- 

 ported by staking, which would add greatly to the costs of production. 



He also advocated the shipping of citrus fruits, especially of oranges 

 and grape-fruits. Sir Cavendish Boyle, Vice-President of the Society in 

 the year I was President, was a staunch advocate of the great possibilities 

 of a fruit industry but he gave prominence specially to lime- 

 growing. I may here record that the first planting of limes on a 

 large scale at Onderneeming which took place in 1900 was due 

 to directions I received from Sir Cavendish. Unfortunately the 

 immediately succeeding " powers that be " did not see eye to eye with 

 him with regard to possibilities of a lime-growing industry and I was not 

 allowed to plant with limes the belt of land which Sir Cavendish had 

 selected for that purpose. If we had been able to follow up lime-planting 

 at Onderneeming on the lines he advocated, that industry in British 

 Guiana would be further advanced than it is to-day. 



In 1906 a visit by Mr. W. L. Bennett on behalf of a syndicate of 

 lime-juice and citric acid makers increased the interest taken in the pos- 

 sible cultivation of limes. The starting of a plantation at Agatush, Esse- 

 quibo Kiver and the establishment of a small citrate of lime factory at 

 Aurorr by the syndicate gave a stimulus to the planting of limes. In 

 1897 there were not more than 5 acres in the colony devoted to lime- 

 growing ; now there are upwards of 1,480 acres. It has been proved 

 that there are wide areas of land available, and very suitable, fur the 



