and Magazine of the Ceylon Agricultural Society.— November, 1911. 471 



at intervals according to the desired thickness. 

 The size of the sheets would vary, of course, 

 according to the size of the roller used. It is 

 desirable that the sheets should be of uniform 

 thickness and size, so the rollers should be all 

 the same size. The rubber should not be ex- 

 posed to light more than is possible, so when- 

 ever the roller is not in use it should be kept in 

 a pail of water, and the sheets that have been 

 collected should also be kept in water and 

 brought in from the plantation twice a day, 

 after the morning and evening tapping. 



It is state d that further experimentation is 

 necessary before a definite opinion as to the mer- 

 its of this method can be expressed. 



TWENTY-TWO YEARS' COFFEE, TEA, 

 AND RUBBER PLANTING. 



IJST CEYLON AND SOUTHERN INDIA. 

 An Interview with Mr. James A. R, Clark. 



It is probable that no one has had a wider and 

 fuller experience of Mid-East planting than has 

 fallen to the lot of Mr J A R Clark, the well- 

 known Travancore planter. The twenty-two 

 years of his active service in the East, first as 

 assistant on a Ceylon plantation and subse- 

 quently as a planter in Southern India cover 

 precisely the most momentous period in the 

 history of the Plantations. Mr Clark saw the 

 vast coffee planting industry at the height of 

 its success, saw it devastated by the leaf-disease 

 that came suddenly and without warning and 

 laid the coffee lands waste. Dpon the ruins of 

 this great industry he assisted in the building 

 up of a greater industry still, that of tea, and he 

 was among the first in Southern India to plant 

 rubber. He is, in fact, one of that indomitable 

 band of British planters who proved, once and 

 for all, that so long as there is a plant of econo- 

 mic value to be planted, the Mid-East will never 

 fail to make good. 



" I arrived in Ceylon," said Mr Clark, in an- 

 swer to our first question, "on April 1st, 1866, 

 and took up my first position as assistant on the 

 Niagara Estate on July 5th in the same year. 

 The plantation was, of course, coffee," 



" You did not remain iu Ceylon long ?" 



"No. In 1869 I left for Travancore, where I 

 became manager to my uncle, and, later, set up 

 as a planter on my own.'' 



" Again the plantation was coffee ?" 



"Yes. Asof course you know, in the 'seventies 

 came the disease which practically ruined the 

 coffee industry. But, as a matter of fact, its re- 

 sults were not so severely felt 'n Travancore as 

 in Ceylon, and I am inclined to think that the 

 use of shade trees had something to do with the 

 coffee plants' comparative immunity in Southern 

 India. Indeed, on my old estate, there are still 

 old coffee plants which survived the visitation of 

 the pest, and are still flourishing." 



'"In the case of tea, shade trees are out of the 

 question ?" 



" Quite. The present decrease in output, the 

 large decrease which is not to be ascribed to the 

 recent drought, is due entirely to the growth of 

 the inter-planted rubber killing off the tea. This 

 shortage is, of course, likely to bring about a 



steady increase in the planted area of tea, both 

 in Ceylon and Southern India." 



" Tell me how you prepare a tea-garden." 



" We clear and fell the jungle, and then burn off. 

 In Southern India the Government forbids the 

 felling of valuabletimber; suchtreesare leftstan- 

 ding, and, after tho burn, the planter settles with 

 the Government whether they shall remove the 

 timber or whether it shall be|used on the estate." 



•'You do not clear away the burnt logs, or 

 remove the stumps ?' 



" No ; they do no harm to tea, and, not doing 

 haTn, they probably enrich the soil as they rot." 



" You clean weed ?" 



" Yes ; but we sow dadaps, a legume which 

 shades tho ground, preserving moisture, pre- 

 vents waste, and keeps down the weeds." 



" Do you leave a belt of forest ?" 



"In India, yes ; as a wind-screen. In Ceylon, 

 on the old coffee lands, the forest has, of course, 

 been cleared away, and there is no natural wind- 

 screen to be left, nor does the Ceylon planter 

 prepare one." [Windbelts are very common on 

 Ceylon Tea Estates now.— A. M, & J. F.] 



" When the subject of clean weeding is dis- 

 cussed in connection with rubber, some people 

 are apt to become humorous at the expense of 

 Ceylon clean-weeding,'' 



" Well, I must say, in the old days it was 

 rather vigorous. Indeed, in many cases, not 

 only the weeds but the whole of the top-soil 

 was hoed into the rivers. Now, however, the 

 weeding, though severe, is done without in- 

 jury to the soil, " 



" Does the tea nursery differ from the plan- 

 tation ?" 



" No, it is simply a part of it set aside for pro- 

 pagating young plants. Tea-seed, however, dif- 

 fers greatly in its germinating power, a good 

 proportion is lost. Ants are very troublesome 

 in this connection." 



" What was the origin of the seeds ?" 



" They came from Assam, where the tea- 

 plant is indigenous. I have found indigenous 

 tea in Travancore, but it was of poor quality." 



" What is the best soil for tea ?" 



" A rich loam. The elevation should be high, 

 and the climate should be hot, and two showers 

 a week is the ideal rainfall. Long droughts are 

 bad for tea, as is a damp, ill-drained soil. Tea 

 will grow at a low elevation, but it is of poor 

 quality." 



" What about manure ?" 



" We manure whenever necessary. Indeed, 

 as an illustration of the value of a particularly 

 rich soil, I may quote the case of a disused 

 bandypetta planted up by the Mazawattee 

 Company. A bandypetta is the enclosure where, 

 on the old coffee estates, the laden carts and 

 thair teams were stationed for unloading. In 

 the course of years such a place becomes richly 

 mauured, and in one instance yielded no less 

 than a thousand lb. of tea per acre." 



" Are there any special varieties of the tea 

 plant ?" 



" Well, there is the indigenous plant and the 

 hybrid jat. The quality ol the finished pro- 

 duct depends upon the growth of the plant, 

 the climate, the condition of weather during 

 picking, and so on; and then upon the age and 

 size of leaf. If you take a branch, the choicest 



