PEODUCTION AT OTHEE POINTS. 157 



cultivation is declining, and this is probably due to the pushing 

 of the sugar industry, which flourishes by reason of the recipro- 

 city treaty with the United States, which admits sugar into ports 

 of the country free of duty, this, giving a monopoly to capitalists 

 on the Pacific coast owning sugar refineries. These parties have 

 opened large sugar estates in the Sandwich Islands, and are mak- 

 ing the most of a treaty conferring quite extraordinary privileges, 

 and having several years yet to run. The legislation which au- 

 thorized this treaty was not above suspicion, and, while it may 

 succeed in its object and enrich a few persons who were in a 

 position to monopolize its benefits, it is unjust to our American 

 sugar industry and opposed to the time-honored principle of no 

 favoritism, which has heretofore ruled in the foreign policy of 

 the United States. 



In the island of Taviuni, in the Fiji group, there are some 

 half dozen coffee-estates, ranging in area from fifty to three hun- 

 dred acres. Coffee-trees here are just coming into bearing (1880). 

 At the Sydney exhibition the first gold medal was awarded to an 

 exhibit of coffee from Fiji. The leaf disease has, however, made 

 its appearance on some of the estates. So far as its present rela- 

 tions to the world's supply are concerned, Fiji is scarcely worth 

 the mention. Tahiti grows a few tons annually. 



Is the United States to enter the lists as a coffee-producing 

 country ? From the Annual Report of the Agricultural Bureau 

 (1879) it appears that coffee has been successfully cultivated 

 within our own borders. A Mrs. Julia Atzeroth, of Braiden 

 Town, Manatee County, Florida, sent to Commissioner Le Due a 

 branch of coffee grown in the open air, together with the follow- 

 ing letter : 



Gen. W. Gr. Le Drc, Oommissioner, Washington, D. 0.: 



Dear Sir — Yours of the 30th of last month arrived safe, and I can assure 

 you that I felt greatly honored to find that you appreciate my experiment in 

 growing coffee, and that mine should be the only cofEee in the XTnited States. I 

 feel sure it can be successfully grown farther south, where frost never comes, 

 and there is an abundance of land and soil suited to its growth. My trees are 

 now attracting considerable attention. Many persons come to see them and ask 

 for seed. 



I have given some seed, and I will try to encourage its cultivation, to im- 

 prove the country thereby. That is why I tried it, and now I feel satisfied it 



