640 
THF TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [March i, 1890. 
we may rely upon it that full consideration was 
allowed (luring the discussion of this matter in 
London for both inaccuracies, before the Committee 
adopted the Resolution to which it has pledged 
itself. The practical point now has reference to 
Mr. Goschen's intentions. The latest intelligence 
is not very favourable to the prospect of the tea 
duty beiDg touched at all ; but we may see " the 
unexpected" occur and a reduction in the duty by 
2d proposed and carried. 
♦ 
CEYLON UPCOUNTRY PLANTING REPORT: 
LIPTON ON CEYLON TEAS — PRICES FOB BLENDED TEA — 
VIRTUES OF TEA IN EARLY DATS — TEA— MAKERS AND A 
LADY'S IDEA ABOUT IT — TOBACCO NURSERIES. 
February 17th. 
When Lipton, the ham and butter man, went 
in for pushing Ceylon teas at home, he made a 
grand advertisement of it. Cart loads of tea chests 
paraded the streets preceded by brass bands, and 
the newspapers told how Mr. T. J. Lipton had 
paid the biggest sum for tea duty — several thou- 
sands of pounds — that had been paid since the tea 
duty scare just before Budget day, about five or six 
years ago. He was in the market about the end 
of April last year when our teas were very much 
depressed, and the prices he offered to sell at were 
startling. A " magnificent Indian and China blend, 
pure and fragrant," was to be had for Is 2d a lb.; 
a " specially seleoted Ceylon, China, and Indian 
blend" sold at Is 6d; while the "extra choicest Indian 
and Ceylon blend" cost Is 9d. From a friend I have got 
a sample of the Is 2i tea, which I send to you; and 
all I can say is that I am glad the name of Ceylon 
is not associated with it. I hardly knew what to 
test it against, but tried congou, and even then it 
came out very badly indeed, yet it is entitled a 
" Magnificent Indian and China Blend."* What the 
" Extra Choicest" Is 9d lot was like I have now no 
curiosity to know : but I incline to think that it 
too will be "cheap and nasty" like the blend named 
tbe " magnificent." 
From present tea drinkers to the tea drinkers of 
the past is an easy transition : in reading the late 
Mark Pattison's Essays I stumbled the other day 
on one of those early believers in the virtues of 
tea. The old French scholar, Peter Daniel Huet 
was one of the first to adopt the use of the 
beverage in France, and has nothing but high praise 
for the benefits he received. It appears he boiled 
his tea, and this is what 'he says of the results: — 
" The experiment succeeded so much beyond my 
hopes, that I seemed to have acquired a new 
stomach, strong and active and no longer subject 
to indigestion. On this account tea rose so high in 
my esteem that I scarcely suffered a day to pass 
without drinking it. I derived from it the further 
benefit that its salutary leaves, with their benign 
vapours, swept the brain, thus meriting the title 
of brushes of the understanding." Now from boiled 
tea those results are not at all bad ; the old scholar 
although perhaps not quite up to the best means for 
getting a good cup of tea was still a long way ahead 
of the mother of a sailor of our own nation, who 
in those early days had got from her son a pound 
of the fragrant high-priced leaf. She was said 
to have boiled it also, and after throwing away 
two or three dirty waters, served up the leaves, 
and she and her invited guests ate them on bread 1 
Visitors to the island are often struck with things, 
which are wholly unnotioed by those who dwell 
* Messrs. Somerville & Co., to whom we sent the 
packet, report on it as follows :— "Broken tea ; present 
London value G.Jsd ; Colombo equivalent at exohange, 1/5J 
29c. Dry leaf greyish ragged uneven and flaky Jeafy. 
Broken tea, rather stalky. Liquor thin, common. In. 
fused tea dark and irregular."— Ed, T. A. 
therein. The numerous advertisements in our 
cktily papers of '• tea makers wanted " led a lady 
visitor to come to the conclusion that Ceylon was 
prominently the land for the spinster, her idea 
being that the advertisement represented bachelor 
planters advertising for wives ! This is about as 
good as the ancient joke of their being so many 
" single-he's" in Ceylon as to make it the paradise 
of the unmarried lady ; and better a good deal 
than the new edition, which had it that Ceylon was 
the land of the one-eyed, as the native was but a 
single-ee. It would be hard to beat this last for badness. 
[Getting a ' mon soon ' in this eastern land is quite 
as vile ! — p d.] 
Tobacco growers say that nurseries put in at the 
beginning of the year, and planted out at the be- 
ginning of the S.-W., succeed very much better 
than when the nurseries are made in the S.-W. 
and planted out in the N.-E. It seems that this 
also is the experience of tobacco growers in Sumatra. 
Peppercorn. 
+ 
Blue Gum,— The extensive growth of the blue gum 
in and about Ootacamund, has had the effect of 
reducing the price of this fuel to R2 a bandy load. 
The contractor will tell you that this rate only 
pays when the wood is purchased green and just 
as it is out down. There is so much moisture 
in it that 2,000 lb. of dry wood cannot be sold for 
the same price without a loss on the transaction. — 
S. of I. Observer. 
Quinine. — A big Yankee reckoning is found 
in the following paragraph : — 
Boston consumed a ton of quinine pills (the Record 
of that city declare?) during ten days of the influenza 
epidemic. 
A ton of quinine would equal 26,880 ounces or 
nearly 13 million grains. This would give 35 
grains for each man, woman or child in Boston 
for the 10 days ! An average of 3§ grains a day 
over all the population is rather too much, though 
there can be no doubt that the Americans under- 
stand the value of quinine in a way that the 
people of England and Europe have yet to learn. 
The Enemy of Tea referred to in a note in our 
issue of yesterday is, we find, the tea bark louse, 
Aspidiotus sp., regarding which Mr. E. E. Green 
wrote last year as follows : — 
" I consider thiB to be the most serious enemy of the 
tea that I have yet noticed. I have received specimens of 
tea infested with this insect from several different dis- 
tricts. Though from its habits it is Dot easily detected, I 
believe it to be present in enormous quantities on every 
estate, where it is responsible for many hide-bound 
unproductive bushes. In the mostinjurii us form of the 
pest the insects are crowded together on the older stems, 
each individual concealed by a tbin scale which most 
accurately imitates the bark upon which it rests. So 
close is this resemblance that atone time I thought the 
inject was actually living beneath small blisters formed 
in the outer layer of the bark." 
The remedies he proposed were as follows : — 
" I would suggest the removal of these old diseased 
stems wherever it can be effected without spoiling the 
bush. After pruning they should be either burned or 
completely buried. It is for pests of this family that 
the Americans so largely use kerosine emulsions, 
sprayed over the trees. In the case of pruned ten 
bushes this treatment could be more thoroughly and 
economically applied than in that of thick coffee ; and I 
believe that the beneficial results would amply repay the 
outlay. I hope shortly to be in a position to give 
statistics of the cost of application of the emulsion. I 
am expecting the loan of a small force pump with 
nozzles specially designed for the purpose of distribut- 
ing the liquid in a fine mist-libe spray. The actual cost 
of the emulsion would be very little, as the kerosene is 
highly diluted withsoap and water." 
