420 TiMEHRl. 



ded would be a scale, large enough to weigh a mule cart and load, 

 placed at an easy distance from, and accessible to, the public road, and 

 sufficiently near the estate's transport trench to allow of the bought 

 canes being loaded in punts by the estate's labour. The above forms 

 an outline of the shape I consider cane-farming should first take in 

 Demerara. Speaking roughly the village area is probably about one- 

 fifth of the estates' cultivation, and there is no reason why one-half 

 of this should not be in cane cultivation. 



There is at present no inducement to grow provisions to any ex- 

 tent, the market being already overstocked, and the growing of canes 

 would soon be recognized as a profitable industry by the villagers, 

 provided the scheme be properly organised and worked. At the out- 

 set, of course, difficulties would have to be overcome, not the least of 

 which being distrust of the purchasing planter, and the demoralization 

 of the villagers induced by the gold industry. If, however, the industry 

 is to be established at all I feel that hope of success will only be on the 

 lines I have laid down. 



A scheme of this description cannot be started by the planters alone. 

 All that these could do would be, to express their willingness to 

 buy the canes. In fa£t, it is the Government who should take prominent 

 aftion in the matter, and to this end, the Royal Agricultural Society 

 would be the proper body to approach it with a carefully conceived 

 scheme; which, I imagine, that there would be every disposition on the 

 part of the Government to assist in carrying out. 



Even were only canes sufficient for 10,000 tons sugar annually grown 

 the addition to the value of the colony's exports would amount to 

 $500,000, more than half of which would go into the hands of the 

 peasantry. Great, however, as would be the direft advantage derived 

 from the distribution of such a sum among the villagers, a far more 

 important result would be obtained in the habit of honest labour which 

 would be gradually acquired by them. A class that will not work for 

 others will frequently do so for themselves, especially when the fruits of 

 their labour are so quickly and praftically apparent as they would be 

 under a properly condufted cane-farming system. 



The President also said that from his taking some 

 small specimens of woods which had been kindly supplied 

 to him by Mr. Quelch before his departure, he had come 

 into communication with a firm of timber merchants who 



