and Magazine of the Ceylon Agricultural Society —February, 1912. 179 



appear that these are gaining ground in Central 

 Asia and the North American Continent. There 

 are no statistics available in London to show 

 the destination of the Green Teas passing 

 through the port, but the home trade demand 

 for such manufactured in the British dependen- 

 cies is absolutely nominal. It is probable that 

 the strict exclusion of artificially coloured or 

 faced Tea by the United States of America is 

 helping to divert the trade from an older 

 channel. 



The Labour Problem. 

 The labour problem of tropical plantation 

 work is not like that of Great Britain — to find 

 employment for all — but to find workers to put 

 through the necessary work. There are few 

 estates so favourably situated that enough resi- 

 dent labour is available and in consequence the 

 importation of workers has become a necessity. 

 Paternal governments in various places have 

 tried to protect the labourers, putting barriers 

 in the way of free immigration to large areas 

 of active employment. Assam, Dooars, Southern 

 India, Ceylon and the Straits Settlements are 

 all anxious for recruits to carry out the great 

 developments of production that have been 

 planned. The matter has now become of more 

 than local consequence, and in view ot the great 

 importance to the tropical planting industries, 

 which have given a chance for enterprising 

 careers to so many of the youth of the British 

 Isles and profitable fields for investing capital 

 to so many others, an Imperial Commission 

 might well be charged with the duty of orga- 

 nising and improving the methods of removing 

 labourers from where they have to live poorly 

 on meagre earnings to the places where work 

 awaits them on terms of remuneration far be- 

 yond any possibility of acquisition in tbeir local- 

 ity of birth. 



Ships' Stores. 



The increasing size of modern merchant vessel, 

 the great development of the navy, the addition 

 to the crews of both, as well as the constantly 

 increasing number of travellers by sea for busi- 

 ness and pleasure, make the trade in tea for 

 ships' stores much more important than for- 

 merly. The effect of this will best be seen by 

 comparing the quantity taken tor this purpose 

 during 1901, viz., 1,524,000 lb, with that recorded 

 in 1910, viz., 2,556,000 lb. In only a few instan- 

 ces do the well-known passenger lines pay ad- 

 equate attention to furnishing passengers with 

 a suitable high-class tea prepared and served in 

 an appropriate manner. The luxurious character 

 of modern shipboard life still leaves something 

 to be attained in this direction. 



Foreign Trade. 



There is nothing much to chronicle for the 

 year in the way of progress so far as the aggre- 

 gate of consumption, other than that within the 

 British Isles, is concerned. The quantities 

 taken through London continue to decline, es- 

 pecially for Russia and Europe generally, but 

 fortunately the deficiency has been made good 

 by the off-take for Transatlantic consumption. 

 The exports from Calcutta and Colombo also 

 show serious declines in the Russian demand, 

 with considerable increases for America and 

 elsewhere, but the latter have proved inade- 

 quate to compensate and consequently heavier 



shipments have had to be made to London. The 

 attack made by Java producers on the Austra- 

 lian markets looks like reducing the off-take of 

 British-grown Tea for those by some 6,000,000 lb. 

 II would appear now that the large develop- 

 ment in the Russian demand during 1910 was 

 only an over liberal provision for requirements 

 that did not materialize. 



Fine Tea and " The Lancet." 

 There are signs that the movement in favour 

 of getting consumers to make more free use of 

 the finer growths of Tea has not been without 

 effect, but it will require the expenditure of 

 much more money aud energy than have yet 

 been given to it to make it really successful. It 

 can scarcely be expected that the producers of 

 low-grade Teas, who have been reaping by far 

 the greater share of the prosperity in recent 

 years, should subscribe to or aid such an 

 attempt, and few of those concerned in the 

 growth of choice qualities have evinced any 

 active interest. What should really be a pro- 

 ducers' movement has been left to distributors 

 and the general conditions of the distributive 

 section of the Trade do not leave much surplus 

 either of time or funds to devote to propaganda 

 work. The Lancet enquiry into the chemistry 

 of Tea has been continued during the year and 

 the conclusions more strongly than ever demon- 

 strate, that the Teas which the Trade rank 

 highest (by the fact that more money is paid for 

 them) are the most economical in use and the 

 safest, so far as health considerations are 

 concerned. Unfortunately, it is impossible 

 for the scientific conclusions of The Lancet to 

 reach the ordinary consumers to any appreci- 

 able extent. The vast majority of them think 

 merely that they wish to buy at the lowest pos- 

 sible price what is termed Tea and it is only 

 really in Ireland that there is a large demand 

 for high quality liquoring Teas at a relatively 

 higher figure. Statistics are not available of 

 the Irish trade separately, but it is probable 

 that the Irish people, who are among the 

 greatest Tea drinkers of the world, staud re- 

 latively low in their rate of consumption of dry 

 Tea merely because they insist upon having 

 what gives a much greater and finer liquid equiv- 

 alent than do the low-grade blends retailed 

 elsewhere. 



Purity of Tea. 



There was a very great increase in the 

 amount of laboratory work done in the 12 

 months ended 3lst March, 1911, by the Govern- 

 ment Laboratory (Customs Branch) in en- 

 deavouring to maintain the purity of Tea 

 passed as fit for home consumption. No less 

 than 10,335 samples were analysed, of which 

 9,689 representing 111,285 packages were passed 

 as fit for human food and 646 samples represent- 

 ing 1,374 packages (122,725 lb.) were allowed to 

 be delivered for exportation or for use in the 

 manufacture of caffeine. Seventy samples, re- 

 presenting 388 packages, were condemued as 

 unfit for food, but of these packages 272 had 

 been imported specially for making caffeine. 

 The Ethics of the Tea Trade. 



In the remote past Tea had a bad reputation 

 in respect to alleged adulteration, but the " Sale 

 of Food aud Drugs Act of 1875 » rendered prao- 



