292 EXISTING SETTLERS 



their maiden crop, which, in favourable circum- 

 stances, is said to amount to anything between 12 

 and 15 cwt. of coffee berries per acre, whilst, in 

 very poor conditions, 1 to 3 cwt. is collected. 

 When 1 was serving in Nyasaland some years ago, 

 coffee exported thence was sold in London at prices 

 ranging from 90s. to 112*. per cwt., and more than 

 one planter succeeded in making a considerable 

 return on his initial outlay, which might have been 

 anything from £500 to £1,000. Naturally these 

 sums would not provide for the expenditure in- 

 curred in the furnishing of machinery, or of large 

 brick pulping- vats, water-races, or other similar con- 

 veniences ; but, taken as a whole, they would at that 

 time (and doubtless still) enable a planter to com- 

 mence modestly, and with every prospect of success. 



Of course, neither in Zambezia nor in Nyasaland 

 would so restricted a capital permit a settler to 

 provide himself with anything beyond sheer neces- 

 sities. His house would have to be of mud, his 

 luxuries few and far between, and, to enable him 

 still further to economise, his native labourers 

 would require to be paid in calico imported from 

 home at the lowest possible prices and rates. 



I have stayed several times at the houses of 

 African coffee-planters, as well as planters of other 

 products, and exceedingly well have I been enter- 

 tained. These men are kindness and hospitality 

 personified, and thoroughly appreciate an oppor- 

 tunity afforded by the presence of a stranger to 

 exchange views on every possible subject, from the 

 efficacy of the last invented agricultural implement 

 to the inefficiency of the most recent action of the 



