COFFEE CULTIVATION AND MANURING. 109 
remember, when you were younger than you are now, 
that you used to give more fruit without any food 
being given to you, than you do now, with ever so 
much food given to you. 
TREE :—You will keep saying ever so much food, 
when I have told you already, that your present 
sysem of putting my food in a hole prevents me from 
getting more than a very small portion of it. The 
reason I used.to bear more fruit when JI was young, 
was because you cut down and burned all the large 
trees which formerly stood here, and that left a con- 
siderable quantity of the proper kind of food for me 
on the surface, and I got at it easily, for at that 
time there were no scrapers to cut my feeding roots 
monthly, the same as now. 
Master :—You say the proper kind of food for you. 
I should very much lke to know what is the proper 
kind of food for you; there are various opinions on 
that subject. 
TREE :- I can make use of many kinds of food, but 
what I like best is that which has a good deal of 
potash in it, witness my vigorous growth when I 
was young, from the potash left on the ground after 
the burning of the large trees. 
Master :—How often do you require feeding. There 
are various opinions about this: some say every year, 
some say every two years, and there are those who 
say that every third year is enough. 
TREE :—All these various opinions only prove what 
T told you at first, that my nature is not understood. 
If you will take my advice you will give mea plenti- 
ful dose the first time, when you make the draius 
and holes I have advised you to make, and every 
year after give me about half the quantity, laying 
it always near my stem, and cover it up with any 
deposit you may find in the equare hole, which is 
always to be emptied once a year, and I will give 
fruit every year, but those who only feed me every 
second or third year will only get fruit from me 
every second or third year. 
Master :—If your advice is taken it will cause a 
complete revolution in the way of taking care of 
you. 
TREE :—Yes, there will be a great revolution if my 
advice is taken in every particular. The agents now 
are the masters of the estates, but let my advice be 
followed for four or five years, and the proprietors 
will be the masters of their own properties again, 
Look at your purse! how slender it is! DoasI ‘have 
told you for five years, then come and shew it to me, 
and I am confident it will have a larger corporation 
than it has now. 
