CEYLON COCOA ESTATE 119 



been put out in less than ten days. It is 

 interesting to see how this is managed. The 

 young plants have grown in their nurseries to 

 the height of about eighteen inches. One 

 cooly gets them up with the transplanter 

 (already described), another wraps them up in 

 semi-circular pieces of plantain stem, which a 

 third man is preparing by cutting the pieces of 

 stem the exact length of the ball of earth 

 raised by the transplanter ; a fourth ties them 

 round at the top and bottom, whilst a fifth 

 carries them off in baskets to the holes in 

 various parts of the Estate already prepared to 

 receive them. Where time and expense is an 

 object, there is a cheaper way of supplying, 

 namely by planting seed in much smaller holes, 

 but many planters think that the cocoa does not 

 come on so fast as that grown in nurseries. 



Verily, Ceylon is a land much troubled with 

 insects. Just now I am waging war with the 

 white ants ; only yesterday they spoilt my 

 black serge skirt. I had converted an unused 

 doorway which stood in a recess, and was one 

 of five doors in my room, into a hanging 

 wardrobe, first nailing clean grass matting over 

 the door. I flattered myself when it was 

 completed with a pretty cretonne curtain that 

 it was both ornamental and useful, in fact quite 

 a work of genius. For the last five months it 

 has answered its purpose, admirably but 



