September 2, 1889.] THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
199 
we think this must have been a mistake, and that 
the cleaning, sorting and final packing operations 
are conducted at Colombo. 
At the base of one of the huge masses of rock 
which remain to speak of a range which once 
extended from Adam's Peak to the neighbourhood 
of Negombo, between the 4th and 5th mile on our 
nice minor road, we noticed a considerable grove 
of specially tall and straight areka trees, 
festooned up to 20 and even 30 feet with luxu- 
riant pepper vines, which evidently found the 
nutriment, moisture, warmth and shelter they 
required in the great rock and the rich soil 
whioh ages of decomposition of mineral and 
vegetable matter had produced. Nothing could 
look more flourishing than the areka-supported 
pepper vines ; but, for fruit-bearing purposes, it 
seemed to us that they were allowed to grow too 
far up. There must be difficulty, too, in gather- 
ing such berries as are produced. Only a few days 
previously Mr. W. H. Wright had told me that 
he grew pepper vines on areka-nut trees, but that 
he turned the branches downwards when the 
growth reached half way up. We have not yet 
grown pepper on areka trees on Bilandhu. The 
viae seems able to attaoh itself to the bark or 
surfaoe of any tree, but with us it finds its 
special affinity in the jak tree, to tho trunk of 
which (the lateral branches being pruned away) 
it adheres as tenaciously as ivy to an old wall 
or limpets to a sea-beaten rock. But evidently our 
chief crops are to be grown upon and gathered from 
the masses of rock and boulders which are soattered 
in suoh profusion on one elevated ridge that we 
have named it " the Necropolis." Many of the 
rocks are already covered or rapidly being covered 
with the vines, and if in periods of drought some 
of the branches of such rock-supported vines 
turn yellow, they recover with the first rains. 
The utilization of our rock masses, rich in felspar 
whioh is constantly decomposing, for pepper culti- 
vation, I regard as a capital idea and likely to 
lead to a large success, if pepper only keeps up 
in prioe. A tamby who purchased our first gather- 
ings at K14 per bushel now offers only Kl2, at 
which price we decline to sell, whether wisely or 
not, time will show. Like tea and all other 
plants in the lowcountry pepper cuttings or seed- 
lings require to be well-shaded with ferns, 
I never saw the tea looking fresher or better, and 
there is a prospect now of the almost interminable 
process of "supplying" coming to an end, One 
of Tangye's steam engines, which are equally 
famous on the Thames, the Nile, the Ganges and 
the Murray rivers, had found its way to this 
little estate of not much over 100 acres, and rolling 
by its agency and power was conducted for the 
first time on the occasion of our visit, August 6th. 
In looking at the engine, I was reminded that one 
of the interesting sights of the Melbourne Exhibi- 
tion of 1880 was a similar engine by the same 
makers which had been successfully employed in 
the raising and shipping of " Cleopatra's needle." 
Truly steam, like a touch of nature, makes 
the whole world kin. As hard rolling seems 
to be one of the main requisites for making good 
tea, the next batoh of Eilandhu leaf ought 
— state of market permitting — to sell at prices 
in advance of those hitherto received. I 
did not learn that the introduction of the steam 
engine had oreated any special sensation amongst 
the estate labourers or the villagers. They are a 
philosophical raoe, the Sinhalese, and cool to a 
degree worthy of high latitudes. I have not inter- 
fered with their right of way through the estate, 
their presence on whioh is not benelioial to some 
of its interests, but that is not enough ; they want 
{me, exclusively and solely, to make and keep up 
a first class cart road for their benefit 1 This is 
an improvement even on the man who came and 
asked for the manure which had collected in the 
estate oattle sheds. He was as muoh surprised at the 
refusal, as was the man who planted a portion 
of my land with coconuts, at not being allowed 
to keep his appropriation. The young coconuts, by 
the way, which have been planted over the clean, 
tilled and appreciably manured land are growing 
luxuriantly, except the few which, notwithstanding 
all precautions, fell victims to the voracity of white- 
ants. All would have likewise perished, but for 
their retention in the nursery tilt well-grown, and 
the liberal application, subsequently, of ashes. 
The termites, no doubt, specially attack dying and 
dead matter, but tea planters in India (and partially 
in Ceylon) and coconut planters know to their 
cost that it is quite a mistake to suppose that 
living and healthy tissue is exempt from their des- 
tructive operations. 
The bamboos (Bambusa arundinacea) grown from 
seed obtained from the Wynaad in 1877 (when 
vast forests flowered, seeded and died down), looked 
rich and beautiful with their curved and feathery 
tops. I have had letters about this fence of 
bamboo, in answer to which I have said, " Take 
warning by my sad experience." Iran bamboo shelter 
belts across the estate, whioh I had ultimately to 
remove at great expense of labour with oatties, 
mamoties, picks and even fire. Nothing will grow 
within many yards around bamboos. We are com- 
pelled to dig a ditch inside the fence, and one of our 
neighbours is complaining of the upas like qualities 
of our fair but fatal bamboos. Bamboos ami acacia 
wattles ought not to be grown near other vegetation. 
PLANTING REPOIIT FBOM THE 
HILLS OF CEYLON. 
WEATHER AND FLUSHING OF TEA — CATTLE MURR1IN AND 
DIFFICULTY OF TRANSPORT — CEYLON TEA IN PARIS 
— CACAO CROPS AND E ORE It PEST — CUBEBS AX PARA- 
DENTIA — A BUDDHIST PRIEST AND HIS THttESHING- 
FLOOR. 
6th August 3889. 
What a time we are having with wet and cold. 
Every now and again the weather seems as if 
it were about to take up, and we were going to 
see a little more of the sun, but the rain comes 
back, and the wind seems as if it would never 
oease. 
The effects on tea are marked enough by the railway 
returns ; and not only has flushing nearly ceased, and 
the average dwindled down to all but unremunera- 
tive figures, but the bushes themselves look wretched, 
and shrunken and cold-like as the dripping coolies 
that work among them. When we have a return 
of bright weather, I fancy we will be kept amused 
with the rush that will have to be gathered. 
Annoying as the present style of weather is 
to the planter, who would like to see the totals 
of his crop statement growing more rapidly, it 
is more easily borne than that of the man 
who has his tea ready to send away, but 
can't owing to the difficulty of getting carts. People 
who are near a railway fail to realize what murrain 
among cattle means. Prioes good, tea ready to be 
dispatohed, and no immediate ohanoe of getting 
it away, are only part of the vexations to which 
those thus situated are subject. I know of some 
men, and there must be many more, who have got 
at present this added burden to the usual worries 
of a planter's life. The aooounts which come to 
us from Paris of the manner in which the Ceylon 
teas are being pushed at the Exhibition there 
are deplorable : whoever ia to blame. It will behove 
the Tea Fund Committee here to get to the bottom 
