-NOTES TO THE COFFEE PLANTER’S 
MANUAL. 
(By an old Planter, ) 
NOTE ON ESTATE EXPENDITURE. 
The financial question lies at the root of coffee 
planting, as of every undertaking, and it behoves the 
‘person who thinks about opening an estate to con- 
sider very carefully the amount of his resources 
available within four years. He will have abundance 
‘of counsellors to tell him how much he can accom- 
plish with any given amount, but if his own judgment 
is not a pretty sound one, he may find a good 
‘deal of difficulty in deciding between the eminent 
planter, who tells him that coffee has been brought 
into bearing for less than HK100 per acre, and the 
other experienced hand, wno warns him that it will 
take R250 per acre all out, to create a complete coffee 
estate, and send its first crop away. Should the 
enquirer be of a sanguine temp:rament, he will probably 
accept the lowest es*imate for expenditure, and the 
highest for crops ; with a capital of from R20,000 to 
R30,000, he will open the standard 200 acres, spend 
all his money before he gathers a berry of crop, 
commence borrowing, g t deep-r into debt every year, 
up to say the seventh; when the estate goes out of 
his hands for less than the debt on it, and he is 
free to begin the world anew unencumbered with any 
of the filthy lucre that encouraged him to undertake 
more than his means could accomplish. 
Another way of going to work has had its advoc- 
ates, and its actors, namely, scamping all the work done, 
from the felling to the gathering; having no roads, 
no drains, no decent buildings; leaving weeding till 
here is something important to be done in that way, 
and then spending as much on one weeding as would 
