Fibres. 



16 



[Jan. 1908. 



" N " appears to have as vague ideas about the decorticating machinery as he 

 has about the Sisal plant itself. He alludes to the Lornella machine as being used 

 by the Assam Planters. The writer is only aware of one Lornella machine in India, 

 and will not be surprised if that one is relegated to that limbo of impractibles and 

 failures, the factory scrap heap, in the near future. 



Engineers are very busy trying to bring out a perfect machine for decorti- 

 cating fibre leaves. One is badly wanted as there is not such a thing as a perfect 

 machine of this kind yet. The Lornella makes over 30 per cent, waste more than the 

 small ftaspador type. That is, the same weight of green leaves from which a small 

 machine will take three pounds of dry fibre the large Lornella will only take two 

 pounds. The Lornella will not clean the Mauritius leaf at all, but cuts it all to bits. 

 The principal drawback to the Raspador type of machine is its comparatively small 

 outturn. But a battery of twelve of these small machines fitted with Barr and 

 Thrusoris Automatic feed arrangement will more than equal the outturn of 

 the large expensive " Tornella." 



More labour is required to handle these small machines, but this is by far and 

 away overbalanced by their producing 30 % more fibre than the larger machine. 



When a " Lornella " gets out of order, and when it does so, it gets very 

 much out of order,— it means that the whole factory is stopped. There is no fear of 

 this happening with the smaller machines. 



It will be well for intending Sisal planters to remember that Mr. Joseph 

 Chamberlain over twenty years ago was persuaded into planting large tracts of Sisal 

 in the Bahama Islands under the impression that it would grow upon poor land. 

 The collapse of the undertaking is now ancient history, perhaps not known to 

 Sisal planters generally. 



Sisal planting will be found to require more systematic cultivation and 

 keeping the land in "heart" than ever tea has had. If a tea garden is planted in a 

 fairly good soil it may not perceptably require much attention in the shape of 

 fertilisers during the first dozen years or so. But, if a Sisal garden is treated in the 

 same way, it may be confidently asserted that the leaves of the second planting will 

 hardly be worth cutting. 



EXPERIENTIA DOCET. 



