COFFEE PLANTERS’ MANUAL. 3 
have likewise to be paid; or rather they are deduc'«d 
by the Fiscal from the proceeds of sale. So that if 
the purchaser be an outsider (not a mortgagee) he 
does not have to bear these. 
Besides the modes described, through the Crown, 
and the Fiscal; there are other means of becoming 
possessed of land. You may buy it from a private 
holder: and in doing so you will make the best bar- 
gain you can with him. In such cases from £2 to 
£5 may be considered the average range: the latter 
figure being given only if the land be either in a 
very choice locality, or have the advantage of a cart 
road to tbe property—or be within very easy reach 
of a road, a river, or a railway. Yet I have known 
land in private hands without such advantage, or in 
a doubtful locality, or when there was a great dearth of 
money, sell at 5s. per acre and at all rates upward. 
Or, again, you may lease your land from a previous 
holder. Temple lands, which cannot by the rules of 
the Buddhist religion be permanently alienated, are 
often let out for cultivation in this way—sometimes 
on a lease of 10, 15, 20, 25, 50, and up to 99 years. 
They cannot lease for a longer period. The rents 
required for such are according to agreement. I have 
known £1 a year paid for 50 acres: and I have 
known 10s. per acre per annum given. All this de- 
pends on the quality of the land, and the competition 
for it ; or on the convenience, or the need or greed 
of the incumbent of the partieular. temple whose 
property it is. He it is who gets the benefit: and 
after him his successor. Or property may be leased 
from other private holders. 
Having now shewn, to the beginner in coffee cul- 
tivation, how he is to acquire his land, I shall pro- 
ceed to point out to him what next he ought to 
do, towards its conversion into a coffee plantation. 
And here I would guard myself against being supposed 
to be conveying unnecessary instruction to those of 
equal or greater experience than myself. My object 
is simply to state briefly, and in plain language, for 
the benefit of the novice in coffee agriculture, the 
whole process of this cultivation, trom the felling of 
the first tree, to the gathering in and pveparing of 
the crop for market. In doing this, I shall have to 
go over ground that has been gone over by others 
before. I shall have to state many things not new 
to experienced planters, but necessary for the in- 
formation of the learner; and which I hope to do 
with as little bias to individual theories on the 
various branches of this business as a clear state- 
ment of the case will allow. Of course I shall give 
expression to my own opinion on all points which 
