November, 1912.] 



AGRICULTURE IN SEYCHELLES. 



To the ordinary individual a knowledge of the Seychelles is usually 

 limited to the fact that it is the home of the double coconut (Loidoicea 

 Seychellarum) of our museums, but recently these Islands have proved of 

 more than ordinary interest to us from the fact that we gave them a 

 Governor from our local Civil Service, and that last year they sent their 

 Curator of Botanic Gardans here on a visit of investigation. 



Mr. Dupont. whose name is familiar as a worker in Tropical Botany 

 and Agriculture, was connected with the Colony of Mauritius before he 

 went out to the Seychelles, and his report which is before us proves the 

 thoroughness with which he carried out the mission upon which he was 

 sent. 



Mr. Dupont's tour in the East included vis-its to Mauritius, Karachi, 

 Bombay, Poona, Madras, Colombo, Negombo, Chilaw, Heneratgoda, 

 Veyangoda, Peradeniya, Hanwella, Mahailuppalama, Coshin and Calicut. 



During his sojourn in the Island he visited some of the best coconut 

 and rubber plantations, the Heneratgoda and Peradeniya Gardens and 

 the Experiment Stations at Gangaroowa and Mahailupalama, besides the 

 Stock Garden, Government Dairy and Training College. 



Referring to the Royal Botanic Gardens, Mr. Dupont says :— *'I think 

 it pays a botanist or an agriculturist better to spend a month or even two 

 at Peradeniya and collect information and plants than to go round the 

 whole tropical world for the same purpose." 



Nothing appears to have escaped the observation of our visitor who 

 touches upon everything that came in his way, whether referring to 

 Agriculture, Botany, Entomology, Manures, Education, Dairying, Poultry, 

 Fishery, Brickmaking, Arrack di&tilling, Birds or Sericulture. 



The following note on Cochin copra and oil should interest the coco- 

 nut planter :— " Cochin copra is famous in Marseilles where it fetches 

 always a higher price than the other copras. 17,500 tons of copra are 

 exported from Cochin. The rainfall is 115 inches and the mean temper- 

 ature 82°. The soil is cabooky with a sandy top layer like Ceylon low 

 country soil. There is no reason to suppose that the soil and climate 

 have an influence on the quality of copra but I soon learnt on visiting an 

 estate outside the town that copra is purchased from the natives by the 

 merchants who cause all the bad-looking material to be removed and 

 turned into oil, with the result that only selected and pure white copra 

 is exported. On that same estate I noticed a curious method of extracting 

 oil from copra which is first disintegrated in the ordinary way and then 

 placed in a battery of small metal mortars grooved in a particular way. 

 Both the mortars and the pestles are grooved and the extraction is said 

 to exceed (50 % being a little less than that obtained by hydraulic press. 

 The Superintendent in charge of the estate mentioned to me that they 

 stopped the use of the hydraulic press owing to the large consumption 

 of filtering cloth which is expensive (Rs. 3 00 a yard) and used only two 

 or three days. I noticed i$ mortars which took 1£ H. P. each from an. 

 eugine of, H> P." 



